


fragmented mind (move to the beat of your heart)

by homerunsilence



Series: delicate hearts & fragile minds [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF Haruno Sakura, Blood and Gore, Character Study, Child Soldiers, Drug Addiction, Dubious Morality, Eventual Happy Ending, Gen, Gender Roles, Haruno Sakura-centric, Multi, Personality Disorder, Poly if you squint, Slow Build, Strong Haruno Sakura, Suicide, Trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-30
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2019-09-02 15:44:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 12
Words: 59,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16789906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/homerunsilence/pseuds/homerunsilence
Summary: The smallest decisions can completely alter the course of one's life—this includes trivial ones, such as deciding between two diverging trails in the woods.(Sakura thought it was an insignificant choice. She was so wrong, and her life began tospiral.)♟Alternatively: In which Sakura makes a different everyday decision and ends up experiencing a trauma no woman deserves on a scarring day in March. One thing leads to another, and she finds herself apprenticed under Tobi of the Akatsuki, who she eventually decides she owes her life to.





	1. Depersonalization

**Author's Note:**

> Important: A scene depicting the rape of a minor is written in the following chapter, and is a recurring theme in the story. Please do not read if this makes you uncomfortable.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning: SPOILERS IN THE COMMENTS! BE CAREFUL!

shallow breaths, sinful deaths.

♟

**Wave Country, March **22****

Kakashi-sensei, despite the worrying injuries he received from his fight with Zabuza, made the sudden decision to teach Team 7 a new technique.

He was standing upside-down, attached to the branch of a tree as he leaned on _crutches_ , aloof and acting as if the technique was simple. “Maa, you get the idea—focus your chakra towards the soles of your feet and use it to connect to the tree. This is one way to apply the power of chakra.”

Despite how cool Kakashi-sensei looked (and he looked really, _really_ cool), Sakura knew that, logically, their efforts were fruitless, considering that it was highly unlikely that some last-minute training could make them strong enough to defeat Zabuza. 

Shivers ran up her spine when she remembered the crazed stare of the rogue ninja they fought a week ago—during the fight, she hadn’t been able to do a single thing other than feebly stand in front of the bridge-builder, Tazuna-san, turning into a shaking, wide-eyed mess as Naruto and Sasuke-kun fought tooth and nail to release Sensei from the water prison.

Sakura’s heartbeat increased due to the knowledge that such a powerful, strong man—who they then knew for certain had faked his death—would actively pursue them, and she felt terrified.

“Wait a minute!” she exclaimed. “That’s a nice trick, but how does it help us fight Zabuza?!”

“It’s the only way to fight him, Sakura; that’s the entire goal of this training,” Kakashi-sensei said, and she flinched slightly, because it was almost as if he was _scolding_ her.

(Sakura had been the teacher’s favorite all her life, so she was not used to such a firm tone, because such a tone was only reserved for trouble-makers and pranksters like Kiba and Naruto.

Sakura, on the other hand, was a good girl!)

“First, you’ll learn to draw a precise amount of chakra to a precise point in your body. This is difficult even for advanced ninja,” Sensei explained. “This type of climbing requires a subtle mix of physical and spiritual energy, and the bottoms of the feet are the most difficult points to focus chakra,” he continued. “Are you getting the picture?” he questioned, impatient.

Sakura quickly opened her mouth to respond, but she was cut off by Sensei continuing his lecture.

“If you can master this, you’ll be able to master any jutsu,” he explained.

Pause.

“Well, theoretically,” he added sheepishly.

Sakura continued to listen as Kakashi-sensei explained the importance of maintaining chakra in a battle for long periods of a time, a skill tree-climbing would, according to him, make effortless due to the heightened level of control.

She was absolutely fascinated with the theories, making mental connections to everything she learned in the Academy and all the new information she was absorbing like a sponge in water.

Sakura subtly glanced to her left, where Naruto seemed to have stopped paying attention, scratching his cheek as he stared out into space.

The pink-haired girl huffed in annoyance. She couldn’t help but murmur an “idiot Naruto” under her breath, but a fond smile reached her lips as she focused on Sensei’s lecture.

♟

Sakura got tree-climbing on her first try.

"Hey! This is fun!" she exclaimed, perched casually on a thick branch halfway up the tree, legs hanging over the wood.

Naruto got up to his feet, completely forgetting about the painful fall he just experienced. "Sakura-chan!" Naruto called her name, flabbergasted at the situation. He was shocked, and she could sense similar reactions by Sasuke-kun and Kakashi-sensei, even though they were mostly impossible to read.

She didn't feel smug—she felt _proud_ , because she was the first one on her genin team to grasp tree-walking. Sure, that idiot Naruto wasn't exactly competition, but even the rookie-of-the-year-super-cool-Uchiha-Sasuke-kun couldn't get it, and there she was, at the top!

A blush reached her face at the sight of the black-haired boy staring at her, and her Inner squealed loudly, amplifying her thoughts.

 _‘We got Sasuke-kun's attention! Shannaro!’_ Inner cried, pumping her fists.

"Well," Kakashi-sensei started, observing her teammates from the corner of his uncovered eye.

Sakura readied herself for his approval, unable to contain her smile.

She was used to being the teacher's pet at the Academy, but Sakura could count on one hand the number of times Kakashi-sensei said something positive about her these past two months, and the lack of praise unsettled her immensely.

She craved for his approval like a hungry man craved for food.

"Looks like the _female_ member of the team has the most advanced chakra control. Good job, Sakura," he stated, voice laced with sly taunts aimed at Naruto and Sasuke-kun.

Her smile faltered slightly at the mention of her gender (because why was that relevant?), but the stinging of the statement subsided once Kakashi-sensei told her she did a good job; he had never given her anything but passive criticism in the past, so this was cherished.

"Yeah!" encouraged Naruto. "Way to go Sakura-chan! I always knew you were awesome 'ttebayo!"

She giggled, but her sharp eyes didn't miss the slightly annoyed and jealous expression that fell on Naruto's face—if she blinked, she would have missed it.

"Hn. Whatever," murmured Sasuke-kun, looking to the side stubbornly.

Sakura almost fell off the tree due to disappointment and defeat. She thought Sasuke-kun would be impressed, but he was mad at her! She couldn't help but wonder why it was always like that.

"Well, not only does Sakura understand chakra, she can also control and maintain it," Kakashi-sensei said, eyes closed, cheeks upturned in what she assumed was a smile.

Sakura wished he just left it at that.

"We spoke of _someone_ becoming Hokage one day, didn't we?" he inquired passive-aggressively. "Seems like Sakura's got the best chance."

Naruto looked at her in disbelief through one opened eye, which was a futile attempt against the sun's harsh rays. Sakura cringed—she wasn't that good at being a ninja, but she certainly wasn't _that_ bad.

"And as for the Uchiha clan, well, maybe they're not so great after all."

Anger filled her body. He was clearly provoking them at her expense! "Shut up, Sensei! You talk too much!" she yelled, using a subdued version of the angry voice she typically reserved for that idiot, Naruto, while simultaneously pointing an accusing finger at Kakashi-sensei.

Her teammates ignored her fit, however, and the boys raced to get up the trees. She saw the glint in Sensei's eyes that _screamed_ how satisfied he was at "motivating" Naruto and Sasuke-kun by instigating a rivalry.

She huffed, then continued to train. Each time Sakura practiced tree-walking, she made the balance of her chakra output more precise. At the end, the pink-haired girl made it up and down the tree ten times.

Eventually, however, Sakura laid on the ground, exhausted. She didn't understand how Naruto and Sasuke-kun kept going; they used more chakra than her because their control wasn't as good, yet they weren't tired!

She glanced at that idiot, Naruto, who was injured from the multiple falls he took. He wasn't making any progress at all! Sakura couldn't help but wait in excitement for him to throw a tantrum, just proving that she was better than him. Then, maybe, she could gain Sasuke-kun's attention!

Unexpectedly, however, Naruto approached her. She observed him, confused as he knelt to her level, cupping his mouth to whisper something to her. "Hey, you're good at this—how about some advice?" he asked hopefully.

Her eyes widened in surprise as Sasuke-kun stared at them.

"But please don't tell Sasuke I asked," he requested desperately. "Please, please!"

She looked at Naruto for a second in consideration. Sakura couldn't believe he was asking _her_ for help.

Her Inner, on the other hand, jumped up and down happily. _‘At least someone notices that we're super awesome, CHA!’_ she yelled proudly.

Soon, Sakura gave in. "Alright," she started smugly. "Chakra requires spiritual energy, so if you get all anxious and frantic, it doesn't work. You have to _relax_ and totally focus on the tree; that's how you get a steady chakra flow at the bottoms of your feat."

Naruto thought for a moment, before nodding enthusiastically.

♟

Kakashi-sensei sent her back to Tazuna-san's house with the instructions to freshen up, and then guard the bridge-builder at the work site, considering she had already grasped the tree-walking technique. Grinning privately, the girl left, feeling accomplished with her achievements.

However, as Sakura made her way through the forest, she paused when she saw two diverging trails. Despite her impeccable memory, Sakura couldn't remember for the life of her which direction Team 7 took to get to their training spot.

Frowning, she contemplated her next step.

Eventually, she decided to pick randomly, and settled on the trail to the right. She wasn't sure if her choice was correct, but it would have to do.

Skipping, Sakura continued to make her way to the house (or where she assumed was the house). Excitedly, she day-dreamed about scenarios in which Sasuke-kun would approve of her kunoichi skills, imagining his praise now that she grasped a technique before him.

(How the thought of him made her heart flutter! The feeling of _love_ was truly marvelous!)

She bet that even Ino-pig, her ex-best friend, had yet to grasp such an advanced technique, despite her being the number one kunoichi of their Academy class—she couldn’t wait to rub it in her rival’s stupid, perfectly proportional face!

Before she knew it, approximately thirty minutes passed, causing Sakura to realize something was wrong when she never left the woods and didn't seem to get any closer to reaching Tazuna-san’s home.

She picked the wrong trail earlier, she realized, scowling in annoyance. "Ugh," she groaned, turning around to re-trace her steps.

_"Stop... please."_

Sakura halted in her spot, freezing. She paused her intake of air, listening desperately for the direction of the voice, and her ears picked up on the muffled cries of a woman, skin slapping against skin, and multiple men talking quietly to one another.

"Shut up, you slut!" a male's voice roared, and a punch echoed through the air.

Eyes widening in shock, she noticed that she was shaking, and forced herself to _breathe_.

She knew exactly what was happening—she was warned of the possibility of this occurring to females during missions in her kunoichi classes at the Academy.

 _Forced sexual intercourse,_ she recalled, closing her eyes in panic.

A woman was being raped by multiple men maybe one-hundred meters behind her, under the cover of trees, and Sakura didn’t know what to do.

As she heard the woman become more desperate, releasing heart-wrenching screams, she came to the decision to get Kakashi-sensei and let him save her. She was just a genin, after all, so she shouldn't have to deal with something like this.

But then she heard it; it was a low growl filled with pleasure emitted from one of the men, and something within Sakura knew it signaled release. After a moment, the same man from earlier said, "Bairei, you take the bitch next, and then we'll get rid of her. Do it quick."

Sakura caught the undertones of the statement, understanding what it would mean to “get rid of her”—the victim would be dead by the time she got back with Kakashi-sensei, Sakura realized.

She knew it wasn’t in her job description to intervene; the woman was probably from Wave, not from the Land of Fire nor from an allied nation, thus Sakura could easily walk away. 

But although it wasn’t her job as a kunoichi of Konohagakure to save the victim, something within her screamed that it was her job as a female.

The woman cried again desperately. "No, no! Please, do with me what you want, but let me live! I have a son and—"

Her voice was suddenly muffled as she screamed in pain, wailing loudly.

 _'Naruto and Sasuke-kun would do something,'_ mentioned Inner, and shakily, Sakura crept to the trees near the attackers and climbed. She suppressed her chakra (something she didn’t _really_ need considering her reserves could be mistaken for a cat) and assessed the situation, following everything she learned at the Academy, which she was still attending only three months ago.

Numbly, she noted that she had the advantage of surprise.

It felt like an out-of-body experience as she watched the graphic scene play out. Three middle-aged males were standing to the side, under the shade of a tree, and a fourth man was thrusting into a young woman mercilessly, hand covering her mouth, her tears meeting his fingers.

They were shinobi of Iwagakure, she realized, judging by their hitai-ate, which had the insignia Iruka-sensei showed them about half-a-year ago during their lessons on the Hidden Villages.

Her body moved on her own as she saw the man about to reach his peek. Based on pure muscle-memory, Sakura pulled out four kunai and aimed at the guy on top of the woman—Bairei, she guessed.

(She didn't give herself time to watch as the kunai met his neck, and he slumped on top of the dark-haired woman, who's reactive scream pierced the air with a helplessness Sakura could sympathize with too vividly that it almost physically hurt—)

Sakura quickly aimed for the other three men that stood nearby, jumping to the ground in the process.

Her kunai intercepted with two of them, one of them to the heart and Sakura watched in muted horror as his tanned body collapsed with a thud and he wheezed for air desperately and as he took his last breath—

One of the remaining two men was able to avoid the strike, detecting her intentions and sliding out of the way, whereas his younger partner got a non-lethal hit to the stomach as he tried to dodge, but was a second too late.

Quickly, Sakura warily got into a defensive position in front of the woman, and she opened her mouth to speak. "I won't allow you to hurt her further!" she cried, recalling the intimidation techniques she learned about at the Academy, using all the confidence she could fake (but that didn't stop her hands from shaking). "Leave now, and we won't have to fight!"

She glanced at the woman behind her, who was scrambling to push off the man on top of her (who was dead, dead, dead, dead, _dead_ —)

"Go," she said simply to the broken-looking woman with the broken-looking brown eyes. Without a reply, she took off in the other direction.

"You...you _bitch_!" the man who dodged the kunai yelled while he helped his living partner sit on the ground. Sakura recognized the voice from earlier as the attacker who called the woman a slut.

(They looked like brothers, Sakura realized subconsciously, with their dirty blond hair and hazel eyes—

Oh. They probably were brothers, but she didn't have time to consider how totally _messed up_ that was.)

The younger, bleeding man looked at her, a pained scowl on his face. "Who the fuck are you?" he demanded menacingly.

Her heart was pumping, and chest was crying, and mind was sprinting, and breath was heaving—

She felt pure fear, the rush of adrenaline similar to their earlier confrontations with the Demon Brothers and Zabuza of Kiri respectively.

It was a feeling she absolutely hated.

"I'm a kunoichi of Konohagakure! Now retreat, and I won't have to kill you!" she cried.

Sakura could only hope they couldn't read her bluff like an open book.

The duo looked at her blankly for a second, before the older man sped towards her and pulled her by the hair at a break-neck speed she had yet to encounter as a genin. She yelped at the sudden pain in her scalp as he forced her to her knees. "It's a Konoha whore, Koyo-kun," he said simply to his sibling. He was towering above her, a good two feet taller even when she wasn't on the ground.

"It is, Kafu-nii," replied the injured Koyo, walking towards her. To her horror, he raised a hand and began to heal his stab wound with green chakra.

Medical-ninjutsu, she realized.

"How convenient. We have a score to settle with that shitty village."

Sakura easily put the pieces together, recalling Konoha's war-ridden history with Iwa, thus it was no surprise that Kafu and Koyo would hold a grudge against her village—that, and she just _killed_ two of their colleagues.

She scrambled in fear as Koyo began to unbuckle his pants, and dumbly, in a moment of panic, she dropped her kunai in the process. Sakura tried to turn around to reach it, however, Kafu, who still grasped her pink locks by their roots, kept her in place.

"Don't even bother struggling," Kafu told her. "Your useless attempts are futile. We reached chunin-level before you were even fucking born."

Koyo made a humming sound in agreement and pulled out his length, and she felt utterly disgusted. He rubbed it, before saying, "Suck."

Sakura shook her head stubbornly. She refused to open her mouth, knowing they were doing this to feel powerful, and eventually, Koyo released an annoyed growl, aiming a kunai at her thigh. She screamed in pain when the weapon pierced her skin, but she regretted it immediately as he used the opportunity to slam his erect penis into her mouth.

She was suddenly being used, and Sakura was overcome by a feeling of helplessness and humiliation. She knew she had to think of a method of escape, but her mind went blank, and she froze up.

 _'Bite!'_ a voice within commanded (and she didn’t have time to consider how it sounded strangely like Inner), and Sakura obeyed without question.

Koyo screamed, pushing himself out of her. Blood pooled in Sakura's mouth, and, disgusted, she spit it out.

Without gathering her thoughts, she attempted to get up and run, run, _run_ , but Kafu, who was still behind her, kept a firm grasp on her hair. However, his attention wavered slightly as he saw his brother's destroyed member, giving Sakura the opportunity to pull out the kunai from her leg.

The older of the two attackers yanked her hair painfully, clearly furious, and she heard that voice, who she was now sure was Inner, speak again. _'Cut it off!'_ Inner yelled.

Sakura understood immediately what had to be done, and she sliced off the pink locks she spent two years growing with one chop as if it was nothing. She got to her feet and quickly aimed a punch to Kafu's stomach, which hurt her fist immensely, but seemed to have no effect of him whatsoever.

He didn’t even bother to dodge because he knew she was too weak, weak, weak, _weak_ —

She suddenly remembered something. During tree-walking training, when Sasuke-kun was trying to get the technique, he would leave dents on the trunks because he would release too much chakra.

With that in mind, Sakura aimed a kick for Kafu's neck, but she focused most of the chakra she had remaining (which was almost nothing at all) to the soles of her feet.

His body flew through the air like a ragdoll, eyes wide in shock as he hit a tree because of the force of the chakra-enhanced kick.

She could tell he wasn't breathing.

"Nii-san!" came a cry from behind her, and Sakura barely registered Koyo healing his mutilated penis to the best of his ability as she turned around, about to fall over from chakra-exhaustion.

She saw his eyes light up with rage, and she froze at the killing intent that escaped him.

"You fucking bitch!" he roared. "I'll ruin you!"

Suddenly, she was on her back and he was on top of her. Koyo stabbed the palms of her hands into the ground using two kunai before she could even comprehend what occurred, and the pain was from another world, causing her to wail uncontrollably.

In one swift slice of a third kunai, he ripped her shorts open, slitting her inner thigh in the process.

And then, without warning, the handle of the weapon penetrated her.

Sakura screamed and screamed because it hurt so much, and she was sure she was dying, and the only thing she could think of was that if she trained harder in flexibility in Konoha then maybe her hymen wouldn't have been intact when this occurred, and it wouldn’t hurt so _fucking_ much—

She closed her eyes and the pain stopped suddenly.

When her eyelids fluttered open, she saw that all her surroundings were dark, and next to her stood Inner.

Shock filled the girl’s senses. Inner Sakura had never been a real person; Sakura developed the made-up entity before she met Ino because she couldn't voice how she truly felt. Over the years, the figment began to embody her not-so-ladylike emotions (typically anger), as well as amplifying her infatuation for Sasuke-kun.

But before, the entity had been just that: made-up. Now, however, it looked as real as Sakura herself.

She was going crazy, Sakura realized, feeling hysterical.

Inner didn't move, and instead was watching the space in front of her. Sakura followed her gaze and saw a screen of sorts. It was a point of view shot of Koyo, taken from behind her tattered hair, with him on top of her, a crazed look shining in his eyes.

Her body was struggling, but it wasn’t Sakura controlling the motions.

 _'I helped you depersonalize,'_ Inner said simply, and Sakura recalled the term from an exam in the Academy on common mental disorders in the shinobi world from a year ago (it was the only exam Ino-pig beat her on, and she had been infuriated).

_Depersonalization, characterized by periods of feeling detached from one's body._

Sakura didn’t know what to do, so she simply watched.

Time passed slowly as she observed Koyo yell profanities at her from the screen, calling her colorful words equivalent to "slut", nothing but pure hatred, anger and sadistic satisfaction on his face.

She found herself musing that, perhaps, in another reality, Sakura took the left trail back in the forest, and was happily guarding Tazuna-san right now.

Although Sakura couldn't feel it, she somehow sensed when he pulled the weapon out of her. She then saw him bring the blade of the kunai to her neck.

She was going to die soon.

She accepted her fate. Her parents would miss her, she knew that much. Kakashi-sensei, Naruto and Sasuke-kun, however, she wasn't so sure of. Ino-pig would probably be happy.

She was grateful for this layer of protection Inner (or more accurately, her mind) provided her against the pain she would have been suffering otherwise; she wanted peace in her final moments.

Just as Sakura was about to embrace the idea of death, however, the universe played a cruel joke on her and she watched as a large pair of hands snapped Koyo's neck as if it was nothing, causing him to fall limp on top of her.

Suddenly she was back in her own body, and her eyes widened as she saw an orange-masked man towering above her, red eye spinning.

"Sharingan..." Sakura whispered, mouth agape and voice shaking, before she passed out. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ I did not initially plan on writing out the rape scene, however I felt it was necessary to actually explain her assault; this fanfic is very much a study into trauma recovery, thus understanding what Sakura went through would explain said trauma. I tried to keep it short by ending it as quick as possible - I did this by having her disassociate. I also used non-arousing, harsh situations and language, because the last thing I want is someone getting off on the rape of a minor, which is unacceptable.  
> ✿ I understand that people may be uncomfortable with this... topic, however I believe that, based on a manga in which children serve in the military and most of the antagonists have inferiority complexes, such an assault is most likely a potential occurrence, which has often even been alluded to.  
> ✿ I hope I made clear why Koyo went through with assaulting Sakura. At the start, he did it due to anger for killing his teammates and an unknown grudge against Konoha, as well as sexual gratification. However, he later violates her because she killed his brother, and he wanted revenge.  
> ✿ Please know that there is support if you've suffered from sexual assault. You can always reach out to a trusted friend/family member, counsellor or even law enforcement. If you don't feel comfortable with any of these options, click this [article](https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/sexual-health/help-after-rape-and-sexual-assault/) which lists more options.


	2. Apprenticeship

composure lost to overexposure.

♟

**Wave Country, March 22**

Obito was expecting this to be an interesting journey, but he hadn't expected this much to occur. 

He initially entered Wave with the intention of monitoring Zabuza’s progress—the ex Kiri-nin was an essential piece to his game, after all, and Obito was intent on ensuring that the wretched village that caused Rin's death would meet a slow and painful demise.

Thus, he watched quietly as Kakashi, out of all people, showed up with three brats and used _his_ Sharingan to defeat Zabuza. But just before Obito thought about interfering, that kid, Haku, saved the swordsman.

Obito considered attacking Kakashi after Zabuza and Haku’s departure, but when his former-teammate passed out, he knew he wouldn't do it for the same reason he didn't when the bastard killed Rin; he had too much self-respect to attack Kakashi while he was defenseless.

(That, and it would be pointless considering that soon, this reality would cease to exist.)

As the kids carried Kakashi into the distance, he made his departure quietly.

Obito stuck around Wave after that, finding an abandoned cabin in the woods to stay at. He told himself that he extended his stay to get some time off from playing Tobi's role, which, despite being the prank to literally _end all pranks_ , was getting fairly tiresome. Nonetheless, it was an effective method to slyly get on the Akatsuki's radar as he pulled the strings from the shadows.

A week later, he received a melodramatic summon from Zetsu, claiming it was a matter of the "utmost importance", cutting his vacation short.

On his last day in Wave, however, he sensed multiple presences nearby.

Deciding to investigate out of curiosity, he wondered if his life was just a big, cruel joke, because once again, he was met with Kakashi and his team.

This time, he took longer to scan the kids, hiding in a tree and masking his chakra. Judging by their appearances, they were around twelve-years-old, at most, thirteen. The boy with the blue clothes caught his attention first; he recognized him as Sasuke, the only Uchiha alive besides himself and Itachi.

Obito hadn't seen him since the massacre of the clan that treated him like an outsider.

Despite their shared Uchiha name, Obito realized quickly that Sasuke was less like him and more like his sensei, Kakashi; aloof, indifferent and egoistical.

Scoffing, his gaze landed on the blond, Naruto, and his heart panged. He was a replica of Minato-sensei, with the blond hair and piercing blue eyes—but the painful emotion quickly subsided and turned into nostalgia as Kakashi mentioned his goal to become Hokage.

The boys were replicas of a younger him and Kakashi, Obito realized, especially with their childish rivalry.

Logically, the girl, Sakura, would be similar to Rin.

Warily, he observed her, and although he wouldn't admit it, was glad to realize that his assumption was wrong—the only common traits she shared with Rin was her better-than-average chakra control and the fact that she was also a female.

Rin was a medical genius, being promoted to chunin at age eleven. This girl, Sakura, was obviously, for the lack of a better term, an average know-it-all. She also clearly had no experience in healing-based ninjutsu based on the fact that she didn't heal the scrapes she got during the training session.

Furthermore, she was hot-headed and slightly shallow judging by her bordering obsessive infatuation with Sasuke; Rin, on the other hand, was calm, caring and loving.

Obito continued to watch them, even twenty minutes after the girl left. When noon came along, however, he snapped out of his trance, and, after taking one last look at his former-teammate, left.

(It wasn't fair how Kakashi was moving on with his life, while Rin never got to reach her sixteenth birthday.

Obito felt nothing but bitterness in his chest.)

He exited the forest to find a place to perform Kamui, where the sound of the jutsu wouldn’t be heard by people nearby.

Unexpectedly, however, the rustling of someone running through the leaves echoed in the vicinity, their chakra signature nearing him.

Jumping on to a tree to assess the situation, while simultaneously activating his Sharingan, he saw a civilian woman running away frantically, sobbing quietly. She was young, probably in her early-twenties, and it didn't take a genius to put the pieces together with her tattered kimono and bruised face.

With a morbid curiosity, Obito tree-hopped in the direction she came from, and within minutes, he saw what she was running away from.

In a clearing were three dead men, the scent of sex mixed with death roaming the air. His eye widened, however, when he glanced at the middle of the clearing; the pink-haired girl from earlier lied motionless while being violated by the handle of a kunai.

It was one of the most disgusting and disturbing sights Obito ever witnessed, and he'd seen a lot of things—she clearly just reached puberty, and yet there she was, being hurt in a way no one deserved.

Nonetheless, he wasn't initially going to interfere. His only goal was completing the Eye of the Moon plan, after all, and so he was about to turn around and leave, but then he made the mistake of glancing at her face.

Sakura's hair wasn't long anymore, strands reaching her chin, and her eyes were not-really-there, and she looked just like Rin did as Kakashi impaled her with his Chidori and without Obito's permission his body acted on its own and he was snapping the bastard's neck—

She noticed his involuntarily activated Sharingan, and then passed out.

Obito stood there for a moment, before pushing the rapist's dead body off her small frame with a violent kick.

(He got a look at his dick and was morbidly happy that she did a painful number on the motherfucker.)

The masked man found it hard to believe that she, the weakest link of her team, was capable of killing of the three men who lied dead around her, but the evidence was right in front of his eyes.

He should kill her, Obito realized as he burned the bodies with his Fireball jutsu. She was nothing but a liability now that she saw his Sharingan. 

But as he stared at her, he knew he couldn't do it. His philosophy was that every murder was a necessary sacrifice for the greater good of the world as a whole, but she was suddenly too similar to Rin.

It would be like killing _her_ , and then he’d be just like Kakashi _._

Obito picked the girl up and carried her back to the cabin, all the while cursing himself for being so _weak_.

♟

Sakura didn't expect to wake up, but alas, her eyes opened, and not to the afterlife that she would have hoped for. Instead, she was lying on a mattress on the floor, and a man with an orange mask was crouching to her level, wrapping bandages around her hand.

She screamed, not knowing what else to do, and unexpectedly, the man flinched comically, jumping away as his arms swayed like noodles.

"I didn't mean to scare you so please don't scream, Kunoichi-chan!"

Pause.

Sakura looked at him momentarily before sitting up abruptly and hastily to assess her surroundings, hissing at the pain in her crotch. It was a simple room with no furniture, and Sakura could only assume the worst, with her being in such a vulnerable state alone with a man she didn't know.

Sakura felt the sensation; it was as if her consciousness was being pulled into her own mind, and once again she was watching her life through a screen, with Inner standing next to her.

"Are you going to r-rape me?" she heard herself ask, and saw her vision shaking, but it was as if it wasn't _really_ her—it felt more like she was viewing someone else's life through their eyes.

The man stayed silent for a second, and suddenly his child-like presence became serious. Sakura saw her vision blur with tears, her body reacting to the situation emotionally. However, she felt herself being pulled back into her vessel as he said, "No, I'm not like that," his voice deep and laced with sincerity.

Her eyes widened. "Why—" she stammered. "Why did you save me?"

There was a moment of silence. "I don't know why," he said simply.

Pause.

"My name is Tobi!" the man introduced, childish demeanor returning. She could hear his grin behind his mask. "Can I treat Kunoichi-chan's wounds now?" he asked excitedly.

Sakura noted how he sounded like he had two different personalities.

 _'Crazy attracts crazy?'_ Inner joked lamely, referring to the fact that Sakura had two personalities of her own, causing her to scoff.

Warily, Sakura nodded. However, as he touched her unwrapped hand, she flinched a bit, but noted that she didn’t depersonalize again.

She looked at her small hand and cringed at the gaping hole.

"Don't worry, Kunoichi-chan!" Tobi exclaimed. "A medical-ninja can heal it just fine, and it'll be as good as new!"

She couldn't help but laugh at his comedic tone. And then she couldn't stop laughing, and before she could even comprehend it, her giggles turned into hysterical sobs.

Tobi didn't react to her sudden meltdown, and Sakura was grateful for the space he gave her.

Once Tobi was almost done, she calmed a bit, and stared at the space in front of her blankly. Unsurprisingly, however, as she had time to think of what occurred only a while before, she felt herself spiraling again, and instead, decided to occupy herself by asking questions.

“How long was I out?” Sakura questioned dryly.

“Umm… The entire afternoon!” he chirped. “It’s 7:00 PM!”

 _‘Well, fuck,’_ her Inner voiced, and Sakura wondered if they were picking up Kafu and Koyo’s habit of swearing—

“Chakra exhaustion will do that to you!”

“Ah,” replied Sakura.

Once again, silence, and once again, she decided to fill it by talking.

"What did you do with the bodies?" she asked, tone flat, trying to mimic how Sasuke-kun often sounded when he tried to appear unbothered at Naruto’s antics.

"I burned them and got rid of the evidence… Why, did you want me to do something, Kunoichi-chan?" His voice sounded like a child getting scolded.

She shook her head. For some reason, Sakura was put off by the fact that he did dispose of the Iwagakure shinobi—as messed up as it probably was, she wanted to bury them.

Nonetheless, it was probably best that the evidence was gone; she didn’t look forward to the idea of being the person who further aggravating the tension between Iwa and Konoha.

"Kunoichi-ch—"

"Sakura," she said suddenly, cutting him off. "Call me Sakura."

Tobi brightened at knowing her name. "That's such a pretty name!" he exclaimed. "Anyways, Sakura-chan, what would you like to do next?"

She looked down, glad to see that her dress hid her private parts fairly well, despite her useless and tattered bottoms. The stab wound on her thigh had also been bandaged up, she noted.

But she felt disgusting and unclean and tainted and she needed to cleanse herself—

"Can I shower somewhere, please?" she asked numbly.

Tobi answered quickly. "Of course, and I'll give you some of my clothes, Sakura-chan! We can be twins then!"

She couldn't help but let her lips quirk upwards as Tobi pulled out a scroll. She watched in mild fascination as he summoned a black T-shirt and a pair of blue shorts, as well as a bottle of soap.

He continued to babble, and Sakura only listened half-heartedly as he led her to a small restroom, before she nodded apologetically and slammed the door in his face.

She didn't dare to look at herself in the mirror, but as she reached to undress herself, she felt herself shaking. Before she knew it, she depersonalized (which was happening more often than not, she discovered.

She couldn't complain as she watched herself strip through the screen, knowing that in her mind, she was _safe_.)

Sakura observed her vessel get in the shower. She could sense the water was cold, but she couldn't really _feel_ it.

She saw herself grab the scentless soap and put it in her hair, which was varied in length—the day before, Sakura would have rather died than used such a product, but at the moment, she could care less, more preoccupied by ensuring her bandages stayed dry.

Sakura observed herself clean the dirt and grime off her upper-body and legs, flinching at her own touch.

She witnessed herself desperately scrubbing her mouth and tongue with the soap, a desperate attempt to get rid of the blood of Koyo’s genitalia, and then gag.

She noted the tears fall down her eyes as she cleaned in between her legs.

Soon, Sakura turned off the tap and dried herself with an unused towel lying by, and then quickly threw the clothes on. As she exited the room, however, she panicked when she wasn't back in her body.

 _'Let me go, Inner,'_ Sakura said inside her mindscape, turning to her other personality.

 _'Okay,'_ was all she got in reply before she could feel—not sense—the cold tile beneath her feet.

She still felt dirty despite her shower.

♟

Obito gazed at Sakura as she came out of her shower, her small frame wearing his oversized clothes. "Sakura-chan, you look so cute!" he squealed, playing Tobi's part well.

She didn't respond, only glancing at him strangely. Eventually, she bowed. "Thank you so much for helping me, Tobi-san."

He frowned slightly under his mask, knowing how he should kill her before Zetsu throws a fit. "Eh, don't mention it!"

She shook her head. "I am forever indebted to you," she said, voice small.

He felt strange, because she was so vulnerable and sincere. Suddenly, an idea crossed his mind. "Ne, Sakura-chan, can I ask you for a favor before you leave?"

She nodded.

"Please don't tell anyone that you met me. Please, please, please!" he exclaimed, mimicking the way that blond teammate of hers—Naruto, he thought—spoke to her earlier.

Warily, Sakura made a gesture of agreement. "I won't," she said simply. She paused, eyebrows scrunching as she contemplated something. "I know this isn't really my place, but..." she started, looking up. "But, are you an Uchiha?"

Slowly, he nodded, his demeanor changing to that of his Madara persona.

She was too curious for her own good.

Sakura seemed to get the message, probably shaken by his suddenly menacing presence, before making a sign that she'll stay quiet by adorably zipping her lips. Nonetheless, Obito knew that, realistically, it wasn't enough insurance to keep her alive. 

(But he _wanted_ to keep her alive, he realized.)

"Sakura-chan," he began, voice serious again. "I know you have good chakra control—"

She looked at him questioningly.

"—I saw the results of your chakra-enhanced hit," he explained hurriedly. "And I was wondering; are you the genjutsu type?"

Slowly, Sakura nodded. "Yeah, that's what Kakashi-sensei told me," she recalled vaguely.

Perfect. He could work with that. "How would you feel being my apprentice?" he asked abruptly. "That way, you can defend yourself better in the future."

It was a genius idea, really. This way, he could infiltrate Konoha's ranks through the guise of a frail, unsuspecting pink-haired girl, as well as infiltrate Kakashi's happiness, a guilty pleasure of his. Furthermore, she clearly had potential, and he'd be a fool not to use it to his advantage.

(It wasn't because she was so much like Rin, he told himself.)

Her eyes widened. She stuttered, saying, "But—But you're a rogue-nin, aren't you?! That's why I can't tell anyone about you!"

Obito grinned behind his mask. She was smarter than she let on, too. "That's true, Sakura-chan, but that doesn't make me a bad person. I left Konoha to..." he paused, considering his next words carefully. "I left Konoha to not only protect the village, but the world," he explained in vague terms.

"But..." she began. "It's against the law. The fact that I won't tell Sensei about you is already grounds for treason..."

"It isn't treason if it never happened," he said seriously.

Obito could see it in her eyes; she was starting to consider it. All she needed was a single push.

"Anyways, Konoha should have trained you more before sending you on such a dangerous mission. I'll teach you what your failure of a sensei should have, so no one can ever hurt you again."

Pause.

"You have more potential than anyone has given you credit for," he mentioned sincerely, recalling how her face fell when that bastard, Kakashi, undermined her skills as a kunoichi under the clever guise of a compliment during their tree-walking exercise.

_Bingo._

She froze, and he knew he hit a sore spot. Determination filled her eyes.

"Alright," Sakura started slowly, almost as if she couldn't believe what she was saying. "Fine. But how would you train me if you won't be in Konoha?"

He grinned. "Leave that to me, Sakura-chan!" he exclaimed, switching back to Tobi. "Just call be Tobi-sensei, and I'll see you in a while! Trust me!" he chirped.

Warily, Sakura nodded. "Alright, Tobi-sensei."

He couldn't help but smirk behind his mask. He just stole Kakashi's student—now if only he could rub it in his former-teammate's stupid, stoic face. "Now, when you get back to Konoha I want you to study genjutsu theory, as well as get a stronger base!" he said excitedly. "Town is East, by the way!"

Sakura nodded, before bowing politely and starting to turn around. "Goodbye, Sensei, and thank you again," she said over her shoulder, opening the door.

"See you soon!" Obito cried, sobs leaving his mouth comically.

As she walked into the distance, however, he summoned Guruguru to follow her—although he was fairly certain that she was being sincere, it was a necessary precaution.

Things just got interesting, he decided.

♟

Sakura's mind was racing as she left the cabin, her feet leading her East, the direction of Tazuna-san's house. She deducted this based on the setting sun, which was one of the first lessons she learned at the Academy. 

(She dully noted how most of her skills were from the Academy and not from Kakashi-sensei, who only taught her tree-walking, which she didn't even need him for, really.)

It hit her: she was so screwed because she just apprenticed herself under a rogue-ninja.

A powerful one, too, based on how easily he killed Koyo _—_

Sakura stopped that train of thought, and instead tried to convince herself she said accepted his proposal because of the fact that he was much stronger than her, and so she, being a mere genin, was terrified.

She wasn’t a traitor, because she didn’t actively want to be his apprentice—

 _‘Liar,’_ Inner hissed, cutting her off. _‘You want him to train you, so stop denying it—’_

The voice inside hear head stopped talking suddenly, because Sakura saw the house and her other thoughts echoed in overdrive. She involuntarily recalled the lesson she had in her Kunoichi classes a year ago.

_The pre-teens were chatting with each other, some arguing, others laughing—overall, they were acting as regular eleven-years-old girls. Sakura and Ino were no exception, throwing insults at each other like "pig" and "forehead"._

_"Quiet!" their Academy instructor, Suzume-sensei, exclaimed. "This is serious," she bit out, voice grave._

_Sakura and Ino stopped arguing. She felt strange tingles in her hand as Suzume-sensei stood in front of the room._

_"Today, I'm going to talk to you all about an uncomfortable—but very, very, very—serious topic," she emphasized. "For this, I require nothing but complete respect. Am I clear?"_

_Everyone nodded._

_"There is a very real possibility that kunoichi can face sexual violence or assault on missions."_

_Sakura breath hitched. She felt Ino's hand reach for hers from under the desk, and strangely, she found herself squeezing back with no complaint._

_In that moment, a strange sense of camaraderie suffocated the girls based on the same feeling:_

_Fear._

_"Unfortunately, this is fairly common, and the code to dealing with such a situation is to, put simply, fight back with everything you've got," Suzume-sensei stated._

_Pause._

_"The protocol after the assault, however, depends on the type. Penetrative sex includes oral, vaginal or anal sex through the use of a body part or, sometimes, an object," she explained._

_Pause._

_"If it is non-penetrative sex, the kunoichi may choose not to tell so long as it doesn't affect the outcome of the mission. If it is penetrative, however, it is protocol to tell a superior, and if you are the superior, to tell the Hokage. From there, most likely, you will be asked to attend at least one session of therapy, and if you are a genin under the age of eighteen, your parents will be notified."_

Sakura felt herself shaking uncontrollably. She couldn't tell anyone, because Sensei would look down on her and Hokage-sama would pity her and her father would silently blame her for being too weak and her mother's heart would break at her only daughter losing her innocence like _that_ —

Haruno Sakura, the obedient student, didn't care if she broke the rules.

She made a vow right then to never tell _anyone_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ Got any fan art (not accepting anything graphic)? Post a link in the comments and I'll feature it in the fanfic, with credit, of course!  
> ✿ This story will be very slow-build. I'm doing this because I want to really highlight the relationships Sakura develops and how they change because of the butterfly effect, and also explore the politics of Naruto, so it'll take time - but it'll get there!  
> ✿ So after much deliberation, I decided that there won't be any explicit pairings besides those that were already established in part 1 and 2 of the anime, such as Hayate and Yūgao. BUT, there is a vague sense of polyamory (if you squint!)  
> ✿ This story is not for the weak of heart. There will be lots of major character death (some canon, some not) in the future, as well as other dark themes besides sexual assault. Please check the tags!


	3. Career vs. Femininity

it will be alright, little girl, your dreams are not yet dead.

**♟**

**Wave Country, March 22**

When Sakura saw her client's house in the distance, her mind began to race, causing her to be forcefully pulled out of her musings. She had to think of a believable excuse she was going to tell her comrades and host family regarding her absence; it was already sunset, after all.

Her team would probably be wondering where she was right about then.

Sakura’s suspicions were confirmed when she heard screeching inside. “What do you mean you don’t know where she is?! Oi, Old Man, I’m talking to you here—!”

Warily, she knocked on the door.

“Oh, Kakashi-sensei! That has to be Sakura-chan!” Naruto yelled, and the sound of his footsteps echoed towards her. Naruto swung the door open and embraced her before even looking at her. “Sakura-chan, where were you?! I was worried ‘ttebayo!”

She froze up at the abrupt physical contact, causing her hands to shake, and her anxieties grew tenfold when she saw Sasuke-kun’s eyes widening as he openly gaped at her, and she morbidly realized how _ugly_ she must have looked if she got such an intense reaction out of the stoic Sasuke-kun—

Sakura completely removed herself from reality the moment she saw Kakashi-sensei’s lone eye focus on her, opting to re-enter her mindscape for the nth time that day by depersonalizing.

Naruto pushed himself off her, and she witnessed his jaw practically drop to the floor once he scanned her. “Sakura-chan!” he cried. “What happened to your hair?!”

“Cut it,” she felt her body respond vaguely as she entered the house and placed her sandals neatly to the side, just like her mother always emphasized. “I’m starving.”

“Dinner’s ready,” Kakashi-sensei said just as casually, and Sakura saw her surroundings shift as she made her way to the dining table.

Tazuna-san and his grandson, Inari, looked up at her vessel with wide eyes, but wisely, none of them said anything.

(Sakura suspected that Inari was about to, but a light kick from under the table by his grandfather probably shut him up.)

 _‘That’s how we’d operate around our grandkids, honestly,’_ said Inner, and the manifestation giggled, but not without noting how Inner wasn’t as boisterous as she used to be. It was also a foreign sight, seeing her other personality from a profile-view.

Tsunami-san gasped. “Your hair…” she started.

 _‘I think I should get back out there. Deal with the situation,’_ Sakura said to Inner, who nodded nonchalantly.

Sakura felt herself gain control of her body as she smiled, closing her eyes tightly.

“It isn’t that bad, is it?” she asked playfully, but her voice was weak.

Tsunami-san shook her head, smiling back (but Sakura didn’t miss how strained it was), and she couldn’t help but feel like she ruined a perfect moment with her presence. “I like it on you,” Tsunami-san said. “It just needs a bit of fixing-up. I can trim it, if you’d like?”

Sakura nodded gratefully. “Thank you.”

Tsunami-san served the food, and no one directly stared at her (besides that idiot, Naruto, who was openly gawking), yet she felt everyone steal a glance every few seconds as she dug in. Her teammates, however, soon moved on from the initial shock and began to compete to see who could eat the most food, and in another reality, Sakura would have scolded the blond one.

But in this reality, Sakura was too tired to say anything, so she let Kakashi-sensei do the scolding. It was his _job_ , after all.

When his attempts at playing mediator, however, didn’t work, Sakura interjected. To lighten the mood, she asked, “So, did you guys get tree-walking?” Her voice cracked slightly.

Sasuke-kun shook his head and Naruto sighed comically. “No! I was about to, I swear! But that Kakashi-sensei made us come home!”

“Hn.”

“Maa, I didn’t want my cute little genin collapsing from chakra exhaustion,” Kakashi-sensei interjected. He seemed to have remembered his manners, for he didn’t pull out that godawful book at their host’s dinner table.

Sakura bit her lip. Well, she might as well create a lie of her whereabouts, she decided, preparing herself—

—And then Inari spoke. “Hey, who’s clothes are those?” he asked nosily.

She hummed, trying to act indifferent like Kakashi-sensei often did. “A nice old lady gave them to me,” she said, giving a tight-lipped smile, closing her eyes (because they say they’re the windows to the soul and surely they’d see what a _fucking_ liar she was). “She told me they were her son’s.”

Success number one: she kept Tobi’s name out of the story.

“Where were you?” Sasuke-kun finally addressed her. “You were supposed to be with the client.”

Sakura nodded. “I was,” she agreed guiltily.

Everyone looked at her expectantly, and she sighed.

“I passed out from chakra exhaustion, that’s all.”

Sasuke-kun examined her with an expression bordering disgust, his perfect nose scrunching up for a fraction of a second, and she felt like crying. She knew exactly why he looked at her like that; he put the pieces together and assumed that her chakra reserves were pathetically small (not that he was wrong) because she supposedly passed out after doing only one-fifth of the tree-walking exercises he and Naruto did.

He thought she was weak, thus less than him.

She tried to pretend that she wasn’t hurt and laughed as genuinely as she could.

“Being clumsy, I also managed to get my hair tangled in branches, so I had to cut it off. And then the sweet old lady—” she paused, thinking of a name for her elaborate lie, “—Namiyo-baachan found me and woke me up. She walked me to her cabin that was nearby, let me rest, and then I came back here.”

She shrugged.

No one said anything, before Tazuna-san began to cackle. He wheezed, wiping away a tear from laughter. “That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard all day! I mean, aren’t you supposed to be a tough ninja—"

It was Tsunami-san’s turn to kick him from under the table, and Tazuna-san howled.

Sakura ignored all this, however, because she could only focus on Kakashi-sensei’s intense and scrutinizing stare.

His focus shifted to her bandaged hands, blood leaking through the wrappings, and Sakura knew she was quite literally caught red-handed, but nonetheless, she hid her arms under the table, a silent signal that she didn’t want to talk about it then.

Her buy for time was apparently effective because he looked away, and the next time she glanced at him, he had magically finished his food without removing his mask.

♟

Sakura mentioned a nearby picture-frame of Tazuna’s family to create conversation, causing Inari to have a fit and run out of the house, his worried mother not far behind.

Kakashi ate quietly at as he listened to the tragic tale of Wave’s hero and Inari’s stepfather, Kaiza, but he couldn’t focus completely, his attention diverting between the story and his pink-haired student.

It was concerning, how normal she acted, yet how different something was, and that something wasn’t her hair or clothes.

He then saw how restless Naruto got, tripping on his own two feet as he made a dash for the door to continue to practice tree-climbing. Kakashi tried to tell him that he could die from chakra exhaustion, but the stubborn kid didn’t listen.

“I’m going to prove it!” he said with determination.

“Prove what?” asked Sakura, voice too soft for her usually loud personality.

“I’ll prove that it’s true! That heroes do exist!”

Then Naruto was gone to train. So Kakashi got up, excusing him and his students from dinner, and Sasuke grudgingly followed, leaving Sakura to do the same awkwardly. They climbed up the stairs and reached their shared room.

“So, Sakura,” he said casually, taking a seat on his bedding. “I assume you know I’m required to know the details of your prolonged absence. It’s protocol,” he stated, eyes crinkling. He felt Sasuke stare at them subtly. “If you would like, we can talk in private.”

She froze, and he saw her glance at the Uchiha nervously.

Kakashi gave Sasuke a simple look that said it all, and with a scoff and something that sounded like “annoying”, the boy left.

There was a moment of silence. Kakashi sighed. “Sakura,” he began tiredly. “What really happened?”

She laughed nervously. “Well, you see, I was leaving training, and you know how there are two diverging trails on the way here, right?” she asked, her palms rubbing against the shirt she borrowed (Kakashi swore that the fabric smelled familiar, but he couldn’t put his finger on it). “Well, I took the wrong turn, and got lost. But when I realized that and began to turn around, I heard a…struggle nearby.”

She paused.

“So, I went to investigate, and it was a few men attacking a woman. Long story short, we fought, I won, I passed out, and then ended up at a Namiyo-baachan’s cabin.”

“Ah,” Kakashi murmured, masking his surprise and rising anxieties. “Do you know the motive of the attack, on the woman?” he asked.

Sakura swallowed. “A gang attack of the… sexual nature.”

He grimaced and felt his mouth twist with anger. “You should have gotten me before you got involved,” he gritted out, not able to control his emotions momentarily. "You know the rules for genin: if you encounter a combative situation, you're not to interfere. You were supposed to report it immediately to someone ranked chunin or higher."

Sakura shrunk slightly, and guilt filled him. “I would have, Sensei… but they would have killed her,” she said, voice small. “There wasn’t time…”

His face softened. “How many were there?” Kakashi continued to question her.

She replied without a hitch. “Four.”

“Civilian or shinobi?”

“Shinobi of Iwagakure, judging by their individual hitai-ate. Two of them admitted to being chunin-level, but I’m not sure if they were being honest.”

Kakashi stared at her for a moment, but when he saw no lie, he continued, “And where are these men now?”

Her breathing stopped, and she glanced at the wall. Sighing, she closed her eyes. “Dead,” the pushed out.

His heart felt heavy with dread. He was suspecting something like this, but he was hoping that it wasn’t _this_ ; a genin, especially a civilian like Sakura, deserved to bask in her innocence a little longer. He wondered if her pupils would continue to gleam with the childish hope he came to adore—

Sakura’s eyelids fluttered open, and behind pink lashes, the detachment he saw was haunting, and although it only lasted for a moment, he knew then that he failed as a genin instructor, because all he saw in this girl’s eyes was his dead teammate as she impaled herself in his hand, and all he could think was Rin, Rin, Rin, Rin, _Rin_ —

“I need you to recount the chain of events in detail, Sakura,” he told her. “It’s protocol,” he added.

There was a pause, before she spoke: “Right… so… I got lost in the forest, and I heard some noise. I went to assess the situation and I saw the woman—black hair, brown eyes, early-twenties—being assaulted by a man named Bairei, as the others referred to him. He had orange hair and very pale skin, I didn’t get a good look at his face though. There were three other men, one with black hair and tan skin. I didn’t get his name, but probably early thirties. The other two were brothers, the older called Kafu, mid-thirties, and the younger one, Koyo, early thirties. They were blond with hazel eyes.”

She didn’t say anything for a moment, and Kakashi felt his lips frown deeply. She was acting perfectly normal; she still recited information like the walking text-book of the team with a mind for detail, and her motions were so Sakura-like, with her poised stance.

But those eyes—no longer did they hold all her emotions, and instead, they appeared hazy, as if she wasn’t really there.

Sakura picked up the conversation again, saying:

“I hid in a tree. I would have called you if I had the time, but they were going to dispose of the woman soon, and I didn’t have the energy to make it to you quick enough. So, I attacked with kunai. Bairei was taken care of with a strike to the neck and the black-haired man with one to the heart. I got Koyo in the stomach, but he healed himself. He knew a medical ninjutsu.”

She was so apathetic, as if she didn’t just kill for the first time.

“Kafu dodged the hit and attacked first. I kicked him in the neck. He died. Then Koyo, in a fit of rage, tried to get me with a kunai, but I snapped his neck.”

One lone eye widened; how could she, tiny, frail Sakura muster up such strength? The girl had _pink hair_ for god’s sake—

As if reading his mind, she said, “I used chakra theory based on our earlier lesson to enhance my strength. It took a lot out of me, but I think I pulled through.”

Pause.

“The evidence has been taken care of, but I didn’t know what to do with the blood and scent,” she stated nonchalantly. “I burned the bodies and got rid of the firewood, as we were taught at the Academy.”

He didn’t know what to say. All he could think was that he wasn’t made to be a teacher, because he should have known better then to send her alone, because even if Zabuza was probably still recovering, other threats always lingered nearby.

He should have at least sent a clone with her to make sure she made it to Tazuna’s house safely. 

“I see,” he said simply. “As you know, I’m always here to talk if you need support,” he murmured, hand reaching to pat her hair in what was supposed to be comforting, but he stopped midway when she flinched.

Pause.

“I have to go and make sure that the altercation can’t be traced back to us,” he said honestly, because if Iwa was to discover that _Konoha_ killed four of its shinobi, it would serve as another reason for relations between the two villages to tense further.

He glanced at her one last time and saw the distance in her eyes disappear. Suddenly, she looked like Sakura again, eyes glimmering with emotions, causing him to be filled with relief. “Please don’t tell Naruto and Sasuke-kun. I don’t want them to worry about me,” she pleaded.

He nodded hesitantly, before saying, “Try to sleep.”

Then Kakashi shunshin-ed away.

♟

Sakura was laying at one end of the room, and Sasuke-kun at the other. It was nearing midnight. Neither Naruto nor Kakashi-sensei had come back home at that point, but she was glad for these circumstances, because it meant she could have some privacy.

Subconsciously, she realized she wouldn't be sleeping that night at all, because every time she closed her eyes, she saw Koyo on top of her—

Sakura knew it was the best time to breakdown without anyone seeing; the perfect moment to let those uncontrollable tears slip. But she kept them in, because if she started crying she wouldn’t stop, and she couldn’t risk blurting the truth of the altercation with the Iwa-nin because of her emotional state.

Her parents couldn't find out. She’d rather die than let that occur.

Her parents—she couldn’t help but ponder about their whereabouts. Were they at home? She shook her head, highly doubting it, because her father, who was a humble career-genin, was probably on another escort mission, and her mother was probably in a faraway land, doing her thing as a merchant.

She tried to think of anything else as she lay there besides memories related to the altercation, mind wandering from her childhood with Ino-pig to that stupid orange jumpsuit Naruto wore.

Orange, Sakura recalled, picturing a certain mask as she turned towards the wall. She began to think about the man she met in the forest.

Tobi-sensei, he had called himself, and Sakura wondered if it was all a dream. Maybe he was a figment of her already unstable mind—perhaps someone she hoped would save her from her fate? Sakura read somewhere that the mind cannot make up a face they haven’t seen before; maybe that’s why Tobi wore a mask?

No, it couldn’t have been fake, because she was still wearing his clothes.

She also remembered her earlier lie to Kakashi-sensei. It had been frighteningly believable, and Sakura had never been a good liar to adults, but when she depersonalized, her body took to lying like a fish took to water.

Eventually, tired of her jumping thoughts and her consistent shifting as, Sakura sat up, rubbing her eyes.

She glanced at Sasuke-kun, and a small smile reached her lips. He looked so peaceful, asleep like that, and she was tempted to quietly move her bedding closer to him.

She abruptly shook her head before standing up; she didn’t need him to get another glance at her when she looked like _that_.

Sakura gazed at her hand, which began to sting as her shock and adrenaline had worn off. Her bandages were also stained red with dry blood. She should probably clean it out before it gets an infection, she noted absent-mindedly, making her way out of the room her team shared.

She needed a breath of fresh air.

But, as Sakura entered the kitchen, where the back door was located, she saw Tsunami-san clearing the table.

The manners that were ingrained in her since childhood by her mother kicked in, and she bowed her head slightly. “Hello, Tsunami-san, I’m sorry if I intruded.”

The woman turned around, before smiling softly, and Sakura’s breath hitched at the sudden maternal presence. She subconsciously hid her hands behind her back. “No, of course not, Sakura-chan.”

Sakura smiled, before courteously asking, “Would you like my help with the dishes?”

Tsunami-san looked at her knowingly. “Thank you very much for offering, Sakura-chan, but I don’t want you to aggravate your injuries.”

Her eyes widened momentarily, before she sighed, placing her arms at her sides. There was no need to hide them anymore, and Sakura cursed the fact that civilian mothers could be as perceptive as chunin-level shinobi.

Tsunami-san gazed at her sympathetically, before smiling. “I’m almost done here, so if you’d like, I can treat your wound?” she offered, starting to clean a glass. “I can also trim your hair,” she added.

Sakura did a double-take, before hesitantly nodding. A genuine smile reached her face. “I’d like that.”

♟

Tsunami-san gave her a pain killer and continued to wash the dishes, waiting for the medication to kick in.

The pink-haired girl watched the woman in admiration, praising her natural femininity. Her womanly figure and facial features, movements and expressions were attributes Sakura wanted to embody since a young age. 

When Tsunami-san was done, she grabbed supplies from a drawer and kneeled on the kitchen floor in front of where Sakura was seated at the table. She slowly unwrapped the existing bandage on her hand, and she didn’t even flinch at the gruesome injury on Sakura's palms.

Sakura gritted her teeth as the woman cleaned both stab wounds. It stung like a hundred needles, but she knew it was necessary to prevent infection.

As Tsunami-san finished wrapping the injuries, Sakura remembered something.

“Can you…” she began nervously. “Can you please also treat a wound on my leg? It isn’t as bad as these, but still…”

The woman looked up, and smiled so genuinely that Sakura couldn’t help but waver because it reminded her of Kaa-san and suddenly she felt so homesick—

 _‘Stop,’_ demanded Inner firmly, and the pink-haired girl complied, halting her spiraling thoughts.

Tsunami-san spoke. “Of course I’ll treat it, dear,” she stated compassionately.

Sakura smiled weakly, before bending down and rolling the right leg of Tobi-sensei’s shorts up, which looked more like pants on her small frame. Tsunami-san repeated the process on the stab on her thigh, which was shallower.

“Now that that’s done,” Tsunami-san started, standing up, “Why don’t you wait for me in the restroom? I’ll get scissors.”

Nodding reluctantly, Sakura made her way to the small toilet. Taking a deep breath to prepare herself, she searched for strength, before stepping in front of the mirror.

It was worse than she thought possible.

The majority of her hair reached her chin in spiky strands that were in tangles so intense she was certain she’d pull off her scalp if she brushed them. One side was also shorter than the other, and each lock of hair was a different length to the one next to it. The worst thing, however, were the patches of hair that were nearly non-existent on the back of her head, making it look like she had bald spots.

She choked down a sob because it was no wonder Sasuke-kun was so shocked when he saw her.

“Oh, dear, don’t cry,” she heard Tsunami-san say from behind her.

“I…” Sakura began, a tear slipping down her cheek. “I look so _ugly_ ,” she hissed, more traitorous water leaking from her sockets.

Tsunami-san shook her head. “No, you don’t,” she said in a scolding tone, but Sakura barely heard it.

Sakura had struggled with her femininity since she entered the Academy at age eight.

Before, when Sakura was attending civilian school, she felt beautiful. She was liked by the other civilian girls, being soft-spoken and timid. She had simple dreams; Sakura wanted to get married and have one child, nothing more, nothing less.

However, one day, her father enrolled her into the Konohagakure Shinobi Academy.

Sakura didn’t want to become a ninja, but she didn’t complain, because she was completing her father’s dream—she knew her father grew up with the goal of being an elite shinobi, but his chances were stolen during a mission gone wrong, after which he received a permanent back injury.

He was told he could never advance in the ranks past genin.

Haruno Kizashi was living vicariously through his only child. How could Sakura take that from him?

However, not only were the bullies at the Academy merciless, consistently teasing her about her unproportioned forehead and destroying her self-esteem, but her womanhood was battling with the shinobi she was training to be.

Women are nurturing, weak and need to be protected; shinobi are ruthless, strong and independent.

Sakura didn’t want to give up being a woman, but she wanted to succeed in her job as a shinobi, so she tried to be both, advancing adequately at the Academy while taking good care of her physical appearance at the same time. Her hair had been especially symbolic, representing her worth as a woman.

Now that her hair was in tatters, certain parts shorter than that of most men, her femininity was taken.

“I could shave it all off,” Tsunami-san said abruptly, snapping her out of her musings.

Sakura’s eyes widened as she rubbed them furiously, trying to rid the tears.

“I know it’s… daunting, but my niece took a risk and shaved it. Now all everybody says about her is that she’s so confident,” she explained softly. “She also looks great.”

Sakura stared in the mirror, horrified that she was actually considering the option. “It would only emphasize my large forehead,” she murmured, frowning.

Tsunami-san produced a rather unladylike snort, catching her by surprise. “Your forehead is just fine, and don’t you let anyone tell you otherwise.”

The frown on Sakura’s lips deepened.

 _‘I think we should do it,’_ Inner spoke suddenly. _‘It’ll look better than the shambles it’s in right now.’_

The pink-haired girl couldn’t believe herself as she slowly nodded. “Okay, Tsunami-san,” she started, taking a deep breath. “I’m ready.”

She watched in muted horror as Tsunami-san smiled reassuringly, before using a comb and pair of scissors to snip at her tattered locks.

♟

Kakashi came back to Tazuna’s house in the morning after covering the traces of his student’s unfortunate altercation with the Iwa-nin (specifically, the overwhelming scent of rape, blood and death). He distractedly used a water-release technique he acquired with the Sharingan, watching the blood stains liquefy and sensing the scent disappear. 

He opened the door slowly. He expected everyone to be asleep, but instead he walked in on a missing Naruto, a comically flabbergasted Sasuke as he gawked openly in an un-Uchiha-like manner at his female teammate, and a Sakura with a buzz-cut glancing at her crush nervously.

“Looks good,” was all he could say, stunned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ A girl with a buzz-cut. I know it's unconventional, but honestly: HOT! Thoughts?  
> ✿ As you might see, I will stick to core traits of Sakura's character in canon because I want to explore how trauma, which causes the butterfly effect, changes her mental state and relationships. However, that also means the "annoying" aspects of her will stick haha.  
> ✿ I decided to give Tsunami some more significance. A lot of fanfics dismiss her as a simple housewife, but honestly despite being a side, civilian character, she was pretty cool.  
> ✿ I know a lot of people hated how Kakashi dealt with most of the Wave Arc? Honestly, he should have turned them around after the Demon Brothers considering they were genin and his handling of his students was pretty bad. BUT that's what I love about his character - he's flawed because of his trauma, and he grows, so I want to emphasize that he's human, but he's trying.


	4. To Be a Shinobi

the world isn't great, so one alone cannot carry the weight.

♟

**Wave Country, March 23**

Sakura didn’t know how things became so perfect so quickly, because her crush, the boy she liked since she was nine-years-old, was _staring_ at her when she woke up.

In the morning, right after she opened her eyes suddenly from her thirty-minute nap, Inner taking initiative to pull her out of an upcoming nightmare, she was met by Sasuke-kun’s incredulous stare from the other side of the room.

Before she could react to the situation, Kakashi-sensei walked in.

There was an awkward silence, and Sakura wished the ground would swallow her whole.

“Looks good,” was all Sensei said in reference to her buzz-cut, causing Sakura’s already noticeable blush to intensify.

Unsurely, she met Sasuke-kun’s eyes, who glanced away suddenly, the tips of his ears reddening at being caught staring.

Sakura couldn’t believe her vision, but the evidence of Sasuke-kun's reaction was right in front of her.

Abruptly, Sakura grabbed her pack and hastily left to freshen up, smiling like a goofball because she just got Sasuke-kun’s undivided attention! If all it took was shaving her head, she would have done it _years_ ago—

—but she was under the clearly _false_ impression that Sasuke-kun liked girls with long hair, she realized, scowling.

The girl forgot her annoyance quickly and squealed as she got into the shower, enjoying the way her heart fluttered because of her crush, a sensation which brought a feeling of normalcy to her.

Washing up wasn’t as hard as before, she noted gladly. She still flinched when the water hit her, but it was easier—baby steps, she supposed. She didn’t even have to spend extra time shampooing, detangling and drying her hair now that it was so short!

After freshening up, she stared at herself in the mirror. She didn’t look bad; just a little tomboyish with the buzz-cut, that’s all.

Ino-pig would totally tease her, though, but Sakura could handle it.

She was about to throw on her signature red top from yesterday. She already washed off the evidence of her altercation with the Iwa-nin, but something about the fabric felt _wrong_ to her all of a sudden, as if it wasn’t hers.

Instead, she grabbed a long-sleeved green shirt and pair of tights she packed because of her mother’s nagging.

Sakura was about to use her hitai-ate as a headband, but she realized it would look absolutely foolish now that she didn’t have any hair to tie. Grumbling, she secured it around her forehead, which was the object’s original purpose.

She quickly realized that she didn’t particularly hate how it looked.

But although it hid her forehead well, she had told Ino-pig that she wouldn't wear it around her head until she became a "true shinobi", and it was clear to her that she hadn't reached said goal because she didn't even know what it really meant to be a shinobi. So, in order to keep her promise, Sakura secured it around her thigh, adding protection to her new scar. 

Her eye bags were bad, however, considering she hadn’t been able to sleep all night for longer than thirty minutes. The girl pulled out some concealer and applied it to hide the evidence of sleep deprivation.

Yawning, Sakura made her way downstairs. Tazuna-san and Inari only looked at her with curiosity for a moment, but they weren’t as surprised by her hair as the day before.

Things moved without a hitch that day. After eating her breakfast and exchanging pleasant chatter with Tsunami-san, Sakura followed Tazuna-san on guard duty.

Physically, guard duty was uneventful, but when she saw the hungry, poverty-stricken kids of Wave Country, her heart ached, and she shed tears, because they were _children_ , and children deserved to bask in happiness. 

Children didn’t deserve to have to fight to _survive_.

♟

**Wave Country, March 24**

Kakashi summoned a grumpy Pakkun.

The ninken snarled. “You interrupted my beauty sleep, Kakashi.” If looks could kill, then the white-haired man would have experienced a painful demise.

He sweat-dropped. “Ah, sorry,” he said not-very-sincerely. Then, he pulled out two letters. “I just need you to deliver this to Sandaime-sama, and this one to the Haruno residence.”

In the first letter, Kakashi wrote a report detailing all the events of the mission so far to Hokage-sama. The other one, however, had been addressed to Haruno Kizashi and Haruno Mebuki, briefing them about the fact that their daughter had her first kill (or kills) for reasons outside the mission. He also mentioned their estimated time of arrival. 

The dog growled as he grabbed the envelopes with his mouth and ran off.

Sighing, Kakashi glanced at his two male students, who were still struggling with tree-walking; despite the difficult task, they continued to persevere, causing him to smile.

(He just hoped that Sakura had it in her to persevere like them, too, otherwise the shinobi world would eat her alive.)

♟

Sakura had been absolutely fine since the _incident_ , as she had been referring to it in her head—

—and then in the night she just _broke_.

The tears came out of nowhere, like an incoming flood, and she couldn’t control it. 

She promptly shut herself in Team 7’s room, and she kept on wailing, ugly sobs escaping her throat as she clutched her chest, feeling her heartbeat go a steady _thump-thump-thump-thump-thump_ , rocking back and forth to the soothing rhythm _._

Suddenly, Sakura recalled a memory she hadn’t thought of in ages: the death of her father’s genin teammates when she was five-years-old.

It was a vivid memory to her, because although she didn’t know her father’s team well enough to care, it was the first time she had seen her typically upbeat, jovial and charismatic father cry.

She recalled that despite Tou-san’s eyes being a mix of blue and green, they held nothing but darkness that day. Her father had locked himself in his room, leaving only to eat dinner with a numb, pale face, and she recalled being shaken and distraught by the simple fact that he was shaken and distraught.

Three days later, he was back on his feet, throwing on the black cape he wore on top of his regular clothes during missions, preparing to leave for an escort assignment.

_“Sakura-chan—It’s important to grieve, especially in this profession.”_

Pause.

 _“But no matter what, a shinobi should never grieve for longer than three days,”_ he had told her before he left, _“because if they don’t get back into their routine as soon as possible, it’ll be much harder to get back up later.”_

Sakura decided that she will grieve for everything she had went through; she would grieve for the loss of her innocence, and she would grieve for the men she had killed, despite how they had hurt her, and then in three days, she would _get back up_.

So, hands shaking and eyes jaded, she got into her bedding, laying in the fetal position.

♟

**Wave Country, March 25**

Sakura’s grieving routine was simple, really.

She ate breakfast in bed in the morning, which Tsunami-san would force her to consume with the firmness of a mother; she cried and screamed into her pillowcase in the day, where she would be alone and Naruto and Sasuke-kun wouldn’t know of her sadness, because they were too busy training; and she slept in the night after a short shower, mentally and physically exhausted.

She knew Kakashi-sensei was worried, so she tried not to cry in his presence. Nonetheless, she could still she the shape of a frown etched on his face from beneath his mask.

At some point, he had tried to console her, and she pushed his hand away.

“Not now, please, Sensei...” she started weakly. “I need some time alone, that’s all...”

Pause.

He closed his lone eye tiredly, before nodding and leaving the room, respecting her wishes.

♟

**Wave Country, March 28**

Three days of grieving passed, and in the morning, she forced her eyes open. She found that she couldn’t cry anymore, as a feeling of numbness had overtaken her.

Sakura didn’t want to get up. But then she remembered her father’s words, and she forced herself to stand.

She looked around—no sign of either Sasuke-kun or Naruto, she noted dully, both of whom she hadn’t spoken to or even seen for five days due to their intense training routine.

Sakura glanced at the cabinet next to the window, and her eyes widened at what she saw; on it was a cupcake with a note next to it. Based on the fact that the candle’s fire was still flaring, she guessed that it had to be placed there recently.

Using slow strides, the pink-haired girl made her way to the dessert and opened the note, reading its content:

_A little birdy told me someone turned thirteen today! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SAKURA-CHAN!_

_—Tobi-sensei_

Sakura’s mouth fell.

Despite she and her parents celebrating her birthday before the mission, since they weren’t certain that she’d get back from Wave on time, she had completely forgotten about it, and panic consumed her, because this Tobi person had somehow figured out a detail she didn’t even tell her teammates about.

On top of that, he was skilled enough to enter her room while she was asleep without her even noticing—

Was he watching her? She shook her head; the most he could find out about her was basic information, such as her name, age and registration ID through a basic background check...

...right?

(Either way, she was screwed, a fact that the voice in her head kept reminding her of.)

Sakura stood unmoving for ten minutes, debating her next steps, before her attention landed on the dessert, and her stomach grumbled. The food looked so good, she thought, and Sakura had always loved sweet things.

Hesitantly, she touched it, smelling it to test if it was poisoned, as she had learned to do in the Academy. When she decided it was safe, she took a bite, and the corners of her lips quirked upwards, the movement of her mouth feeling foreign on her face due to lack of recent use.

Rogue ninja or not, Tobi truly made her day.

♟

Yawning, but with a happy kick in her steps, Sakura made her way downstairs. She was met with inscrutable glances from Sasuke-kun and Kakashi-sensei, worried frowns from Tsunami-san and Tazuna-san, and curious eyes from Inari.

She smiled, and the mood in the room immediately lifted. No one questioned where she had been the previous days, and just _let her be_ , instead asking where Naruto was, because he had stayed up all night trying to master tree-walking again. 

Things moved without a hitch afterwards. Sasuke went out for a walk, and after eating her breakfast and exchanging pleasant chatter with Tsunami-san, she and Sensei went to search for Naruto.

(Although she wouldn’t admit it, she was getting worried. What if the idiot _actually_ died from chakra exhaustion?)

The entire time they searched the forest, she felt Kakashi-sensei’s lone eye staring at her unwaveringly, as if assessing her mental state. It did make her a bit uncomfortable, because Sakura had rarely been the center of his attention.

The duo stood in a clearing in the forest. “Naruto?” she called, cupping her mouth with her hands.

No reply.

“What in the world is Naruto doing?” she asked to no one in particular. “And Sasuke-kun still hasn’t come back from his walk…”

Suddenly, a kunai hit the ground in front of her, causing her eyes to follow the direction it came from, and near the top of a tree laid a dirtied, bruised Naruto.

Sakura couldn’t believe the deadlast of her Academy class tree-walked so high.

At first, he only grinned mischievously, but his eyes bulged as he did a double-take of his female teammate.

“Sakura-chan!” he cried. “Your hair—it’s _gone_!”

And then he almost fell off the tree, causing the girl to scream, but Naruto was able to send chakra to the soles of his feet last minute and simply hang by the branch upside-down.

Sakura released a sigh of relief.

Then, the idiot lost his control and was falling again, but Sasuke-kun coolly saved him! Sakura’s heart was positively _flying_ because Sasuke-kun was so awesome!

Her male teammates quickly forgot about her, once again getting lost in their childish contest to see who could fully grasp tree-walking first. Sakura scowled privately at being left out as she walked back to the house, but she didn’t mind as much as she would have since she didn’t have to answer any questions about her hair, or wonder why everyone forgot about her birthday.

♟

It was nighttime, and Kakashi just finished talking to Inari. During dinner, the boy once again doubted heroes, and Naruto, although meaning well, had given a harsh response, causing him to run out of the house.

As Inari left to sleep, however, Kakashi had a feeling that his words helped, and Inari would begin to have hope again.

He could relate with the boy since he also had a heroic—but dead—father.

Kakashi thought about Sakura. He had been so worried when she broke down; it was as if a switch had turned on, and she was an incoherent mess, pushing him away as if his presence was making things worse.

And then just as quickly, she was seemingly fine.

(He couldn’t tell if it was a normal response for a civilian child after their first kill. He hoped it was.

Kakashi knew that, soon, he would have to speak with her. It was his job to be there for his students; to be empathetic like a teacher, not apathetic like the ANBU commander he still felt like he was, and the thought of failing terrified him.)

Sighing, Kakashi made his way back to the room Team 7 shared.

He observed his sleeping students. Unlike before, they lay close together with only a foot of distance between them, Sasuke at the right, Naruto in the middle, and Sakura at the left.

Despite everything this mission put the genin through, their teamwork had only improved, particularly between Naruto and Sasuke.

Something also changed between the boys and Sakura, but Kakashi couldn’t put his finger on it. The male members of Team 7 had obviously been surprised by the changes she went through, but both didn’t comment on the topic during dinner earlier (this was surprising considering Naruto is so… _Naruto_ , but Kakashi had a feeling his silence was influenced by a disapproving and somewhat menacing stare from the typically nurturing Tsunami).

Kakashi smiled privately, laying down on his own bedding horizontal to theirs, a foot above their heads. He would have never imagined things would be like this when Hokage-sama forced him to take on a team of Rookies, but there he was, teaching another generation of Team 7.

He hoped Minato-sensei approved.

Kakashi was suddenly pulled out of his musings, sitting up and grasping his kunai when he heard Sakura’s scream.

♟

_Koyo was on top of her again, that enraged, psychotic expression on his pale face as he cut off her shorts._

_“No…” she whispered. “Stop… please…”_

_He smiled at her misery, penetrating the weapon into her being._

Sakura screamed, and suddenly, her eyes flickered open and she was sitting up, shaking and drenched in a thin layer of sweat. It only took her a moment to comprehend that it was a dream as she saw Kakashi-sensei and Sasuke-kun’s defensive positions.

That idiot, Naruto, slept through it, she realized subconsciously, unimpressed.

“Oh,” she murmured meekly, wiping away the wet tears on her cheeks. “Sorry,” she started, before adding, “Nightmare.”

Sasuke-kun glanced at her with momentary confusion. Sakura expected him to scowl right about then, however he simply nodded and laid back down. She thought she had gotten better at reading her crush since they were placed together on a team four months ago, but she decided her assessment must have been wrong when she concluded that she saw _understanding_ laced in his eyes.

Kakashi-sensei watched her, and Sakura shuddered under his unwavering gaze. Then, his eye crinkled into a smile. “Ne, Sakura, let’s take a walk?”

Something in his tone made her want to reject his offer. “Do I have a choice?” she questioned dryly.

“No.”

Thus, Sakura stood up warily, following Sensei as he led her down the stairs while simultaneously pulling on his flak jacket. She knew what this was about; he wanted to discuss the aftermath of her first kill, something she had been avoiding—Sakura had been told about this being protocol in the Academy.

He plopped down on the porch of the house, legs hanging above the water below. She followed, keeping a bit of distance between them.

“How are you feeling?” he asked suddenly.

“Okay.”

She lied because she felt distressed and scared and her hands were still shaking—

“I don’t feel guilty,” Sakura said truthfully, abruptly referring to her first kills. “It was either me or them.”

Sakura was more troubled by the “forced sexual intercourse” part, but she wouldn’t and _couldn’t_ tell Sensei about it. Not only did she feel humiliated and ashamed by what happened, but she already broke protocol by lying to her superior—she’d surely get some sort of punishment for breaking the rules!

Also, what was she supposed to tell a _man?_ Men couldn’t possibly understand what it was like to be humiliated like _that_... to be used like an object.

“It’s fine to feel that way,” said Kakashi-sensei. “You know, I could set up a meeting with a counsellor on your behalf when we get home. It’s always good to work through these things with someone.”

Sakura shook her head. “I don’t want to talk about it again,” she stated honestly. “I’ll be okay with what happened on my own.”

Pause.

“Anyways, if I’m going to be a good shinobi, I need to be strong,” she declared firmly.

Kakashi-sensei didn’t say anything for a moment. “Is there anything I can say to change your mind?” he asked quietly.

“No.”

Sensei sighed comically, mumbling something about “stubborn girls”, causing Sakura to giggle. He had been a good _instructor_ for these past two months, but that night he was being a good _teacher_ , because suddenly he wasn’t distant. 

He was reachable.

Eventually, she got up to take a quick shower and he left to go back to sleep. As she stood under the water, she remembered something Iruka-sensei said in the Academy.

He promised them that their team would be like a family, and Sakura was starting to believe him.

Once clean and about to lay down on her sheets, she subtly pushed her bedding closer to Naruto, sighing happily.

She was certain that now that Team 7’s bond was strengthening, everything would be perfect.

♟

**Wave Country, March 29**

Sakura was so wrong, because the next day, everything went to shit.

She couldn’t even comprehend what happened. One moment she was happily making her way to the bridge to help guard Tazuna-san, excited at the prospect of spending one-on-one time with Sasuke-kun without that idiot Naruto interfering—

Then she saw bodies scattered across the bridge—

And then she was guarding Tazuna-san with a kunai when Zabuza came to fight Kakashi-sensei—

And then Haku fought Sasuke-kun and Naruto—

And then Haku died by Sensei’s hand—

And then Sasuke-kun was lying motionless on the ground and she was wailing at the top of her lungs—

And then Gatō came so Zabuza died—

And then she was at their graves—

“Sakura, _breathe_.”

Her breath hitched in her throat. Sakura felt her consciousness return to her body, ending her state of depersonalization. She was staring into Kakashi-sensei’s lone eye, comprehending that what felt like seconds to her was a few hours in reality.

She began to shake because Kakashi-sensei was grasping her by her shoulders to steady her and all she could think was _why was he touching her without her permission—_

Sakura flinched out of his hold. “I’m fine,” she forced out through clenched teeth, but despite her words, her breath remained ragged and her being continued to shake. She noted how awkwardly the boys stared at her, as if they didn’t know what to do.

She ignored this; she wouldn’t know what to do if she was in their place, either.

Sakura stared at the make-shift graves of Zabuza and Haku intently. She didn’t understand why they got to be buried with so much love. For god’s sake they… they were evil! They were ruthless _killers_ —

 _'We’re also killers now,’_ Inner interjected dryly, reminding her of the Iwa-nin. _‘Don’t forget that.’_

She froze, and involuntarily recalled something Zabuza said about shinobi being nothing but weapons.

“Is that the purpose of shinobi, Kakashi-sensei?” she asked suddenly.

“Hm?”

“To use and be used by people like _tools_?” she hissed.

Sakura hoped he would tell her that she was being foolish and melodramatic, but he didn’t. Instead, he proved her point. “Shinobi are all merely tools in the hands of destiny. There’s no point in wondering whether it’s right or wrong; it just _is_ ,” he responded carefully, looking at her as if she would break. “It’s the same in Konoha.”

Sensei’s answer was blunt and cold, and Sakura felt like _screaming_.

Naruto turned around, just as unhappy as her. “Well, if you ask me, if that’s what being a ninja’s all about… then something’s out of whack!” he claimed, scowling. “Is that why we go through all this training, just to end up like _them_?”

Even Sasuke-kun agreed with her and Naruto. “What’s the reason for this?” he asked quietly.

Kakashi-sensei sighed warily, eyes far away. “Well, it’s a question without an answer. That’s something we, as shinobi, have to deal with every day of our lives, just like Zabuza and the kid, Haku.”

Silence.

“Okay!” Naruto exclaimed suddenly, gazing at the sun and catching the attention of the rest of Team 7.

Sakura watched the deadlast curiously.

“From now on I’m finding my own ninja way! A way straight and true and without any regrets! From now on I’m following the way of Uzumaki Naruto!”

And Sakura had hope again.

♟

**Wave Country, April 6**

Sakura barely slept for the next week as her teammates recovered from their injuries, but neither did Tsunami-san, who was still shaken by her earlier encounter with the rogue-nin Zabuza sent her way.

Instead, the two females sat in the kitchen at night, occasionally discussing light topics about their lives, but mostly staring into space, reliving the traumatic events from earlier in companionable silence.

When sun rose, Kakashi-sensei announced they were leaving since the bridge had been built, and Team 7 packed their things before eating breakfast.

At the bridge, Tazuna-san’s family and the rest of the construction team saw them off.

“I can’t tell you how much we’re going to miss you,” Tazuna-san said earnestly. It surprised Sakura, because he had been so cold before.

Tsunami-san, who was smiling sweetly, spoke next. “Do be careful,” she said.

Her eyes then met Sakura’s.

“And Sakura-chan; you look absolutely beautiful.”

She couldn’t help it as she felt tears about to escape her. Sakura ran into the older woman’s arms, not caring what anyone, even Sasuke-kun, thought of her. “Thank you for everything, Tsunami-san!”

Tsunami-san hugged back tightly. Sakura felt a dull ache; she had grown attached to the woman who bandaged her wounds, cut her hair, cooked their food and treated Team 7 like they were children, not _shinobi_.

She couldn’t even get annoyed when Inari and Naruto began to cry at the idea of not seeing each other for a long time, because she was on the same boat. 

“Please do write to me, Tsunami-san!” Sakura exclaimed, wiping away her tears. “I promise I’m an excellent pen-pal!”

Tsunami-san smiled genuinely. “Of course, Sakura-chan.”

Soon, Team 7 was leaving the Land of Waves by walking on The Great Naruto Bridge which connected the once isolated country to the Land of Fire. Although things were normal again, Sakura asking Sasuke-kun for a date and angrily rejecting Naruto’s offer, she knew subconsciously that things changed.

What changed? Sakura came to Wave as an innocent twelve-year-old, and she left as a fragmented thirteen-year-old with trauma.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ The end of the Wave Arc, finally! In the next chapter, Sakura's relationship with Ino takes the spotlight, and Hayate makes his first appearance!  
> ✿ Keep in mind that Sakura's thoughts are meant to seem irrational and childish, because she's exactly that; a child who has irrational thoughts.  
> ✿ I could really use a beta reader! Let me know anyone would like to volunteer!  
> ✿ Thank you all for the kudos/comments!


	5. Poisonous

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just wanted to drop by and thank everyone for all the love! :)

overly sensitive exterior, left feeling inferior.

♟

**Konoha, April 6**

As Team 7 neared the immense green gates of Konoha, a content feeling filled Sakura. Soon, the double-doors swung open, and Kakashi-sensei greeted the guards as he signed them in.

She wasn’t expecting, nor was she prepared for her parents, who stood nearby.

Sakura blinked, and then her heart began to beat so fast she thought it would run out of her chest because she didn’t know how her parents would react to their daughter, who left with soft skin, long hair, and a red dress but came back with stab wounds, a shaved head, and oversized men’s clothes—

Her mother and father smiled, and it was all it took for Sakura to run into their arms.

She embraced them as her mother told her that everything was going to be alright, and her father whispered to Sakura that he’s so proud of her for being so strong.

♟

“Jealousy isn’t a good look, boys,” Kakashi muttered, frowning. His male students were all watching Sakura as she re-united with her parents, Naruto with sadness because he didn’t have his own and Sasuke with annoyance because Sakura had hers.

However, they both shared the same glint in their eyes: envy.

Kakashi sighed, not knowing how to comfort them. “Come on, let’s debrief to Hokage-sama,” he ordered, allowing Sakura some privacy.

So, the parentless members of Team 7 quietly left.

♟

Eventually, Sakura let go of her parents and just looked up at them. Her father grinned teasingly. “Ne, Sa-chan, with that haircut you’ll totally attract all the girls now,” he said.

Sakura choked on her own spit.

“Liking women isn’t anything to be ashamed about!” scolded her mother. “I myself dated a girl before I met your father; she was beautiful, with her long silky black hair and womanly curves—”

“Kaa-san!” Sakura cried, covering her ears (because she did _not_ want to hear about her mother’s dating life), blushing madly as the chunin guards, Izumo and Kotetsu, snickered at her embarrassment. Glaring at the duo, she turned around to see if Sasuke-kun heard it, but she was surprised to note that her genin team was nowhere in sight.

Sakura didn’t have time to ponder about their whereabouts, however, because she was suddenly being tackled by someone around her height.

Initially, Sakura flinched, but soon relaxed into the touch when she recognized who it was.

However, it didn’t stop the surprise from showing on her face when she realized that it was her love rival who was hugging her as if she was a lifeline.

“Ino-pig…?” Sakura began. 

“Shut up, Forehead,” the blonde murmured into her collarbone, and Sakura felt wet tears stick to Tobi-sensei’s shirt.

Ino looked up, nose running, and eyebrows scrunched in heartache. Sakura silently sulked, because Ino still looked pretty, whereas Sakura looked like a sleep-deprived troll whenever she cried. She also noted how Ino didn't even mention her boyish haircut. 

“Your parents told me you ran into some Zabuza guy on your mission, and when I asked Otou-san who that was he told me—I—I thought you wouldn’t _come back_!”

Another choked sob escaped her lips.

Shock, and then guilt hit Sakura full-force. She felt ashamed for thinking that Ino would be happy if she died when Koyo was about to kill her after using her like a tool—

“I’m sorry,” murmured Sakura.

Ino sniffled, squeezing her one last time before backing off, only to grab her arm tightly.

Sakura searched for her parents’ faces. Her father’s expression held deep understanding and her mother’s smile calmed Sakura.

“Sa-chan, why don’t you and Ino-chan catch up for a bit? And then both of you can join us for dinner—we can go grab amnistu?” her father offered, winking.

She glanced at Ino, and when the blonde nodded, she responded warily, “Okay, Tou-san; that sounds great.”

Her parents grinned one last time as she handed them her pack, before the couple left in the direction of the civilian district.

Then it was just Ino and Sakura.

“So…” Sakura started awkwardly. She didn’t know what to say; it had been two years since she considered Ino her friend, and circumstances told her they weren’t rivals anymore. They were in a strange gray area concerning their relationship, and she didn’t know how to act.

“What do you want to do?” asked Ino as she casually began to move further from the gate, still holding her ex-friend’s arm tightly as if it was a normal occurrence.

“Well…” Sakura started, but Ino cut her off.

“Let’s go to the flower shop,” she said suddenly, dragging Sakura along like a ragdoll; it was clearly a demand, not a request.

Sakura sputtered, about to retort angrily, but then she remembered how much distress she caused the vulnerable-looking girl in front of her, who was usually so strong and confident.

Guilt caused her to stay quiet.

The walk to Ino’s flower shop was five minutes long, and the entire time, Sakura looked around self-consciously. She didn’t get many stares—in fact, she probably got glanced at less than when her hair was long (understandably so, considering that before it was bright _pink_ and glaringly obvious).

She did notice Kiba as they passed by a veterinary business, though. She saw him through the window petting a dog, and even met his gaze; at first, he glazed over her, as if he didn’t even recognize her.

But then realization hit him as his eyes bulged comically out of their sockets, his mouth promptly falling to the floor.

However, Sakura didn’t have a chance to react due to Ino’s forceful and urgent pulls towards their destination, but if she did, she’d be laughing and crying at the same time.

Soon, the homey flower shop was in view, and the duo made their way to it. As they entered, the suffocating, yet sweet scent of different plants attacked Sakura’s nostrils.

Nonetheless, it was comforting, reminding her of her childhood days with Ino.

“Welcome to Yamanaka Flowers—” Ino’s mother, who sat behind the counter, started, but cut herself off. “—oh, Sakura-chan!” she exclaimed, standing up.

Sakura was abruptly being embraced by the brown-haired woman.

“I’m so glad you’re safe!” she told her, releasing her daughter’s childhood friend from her hold. “Ino’s been so worried all of yesterday! She didn't even go to see her team today!”

Sakura tried to smile politely, but she couldn't believe that she distressed Ino so much. “I’m so sorry for worrying you, Yamanaka-san—”

“Nonsense!” scolded Yamanaka-san. It looked as if she was about to scold the pink-haired girl further, but then her eyes fell on her bandaged hands. “What happened?” she asked urgently, grabbing the fist.

Sakura gulped. “Oh… it's nothing, really… I just…”

She paused, before sighing.

“Stab wounds, that’s all.”

Yamanaka-san looked at Sakura with disbelief before pity overtook her elegant features. “I’ll heal it for you,” she said, leaving no room for argument as the chunin began to unwrap the bandages. “I have a bit of training in medical ninjutsu from Yoshino-chan, Shikamaru’s mother… it’s nothing advanced, but it should suffice…”

Sakura could only stare as the woman grimaced at the now uncovered injury, and Ino tried to hide her obvious flinch as she saw the wound.

Yamanaka-san proceeded to make a guiding hand sign, and green chakra suddenly hovered over the palm of her hand as she began to heal the injury. Sakura watched in fascination as the edges of the wound began to pull over, and new layers of skin began to form over the tissue, a process which took a total of five minutes.

Once done, Sakura noted in awe that there was no scarring left over. She always assumed that scars couldn’t be healed, but this looked easy enough and wasn't awfully time-consuming, so why did people like Kakashi-sensei still have scars?

When Sakura voiced the question, Yamanaka-san laughed. “Well, a lot of people, particularly men, don’t get scars healed because they want to look strong,” she explained. Then, her tone became solemn. “But, some scars are too deep to heal with average healing skills, and other people keep them because they symbolize a battle that changed them.”

“Oh,” was all Sakura could say as Yamanaka-san began to move on to her other hand.

Soon, Sakura was pulling up the leg to her tights, exposing the stab wound there. However, she didn't show Yamanaka-san the cut on her inner-thigh from when Koyo ripped her shorts; she decided she wanted to keep that scar, because it represented the 22nd of March, the day that changed her.

She met Ino’s eyes, before abruptly looking away, because the worry they held caused guilt to well up in the back of her throat and Sakura felt so selfish for ending their friendship over her own insecurities.

She instead scanned the shop. A shelf suddenly caught her attention, because at the top, in a vase, were flowers she recognized from Ino. She recalled that Ino had once thrown them like shuriken into Ami’s mouth when she was bullying Sakura, and Sakura vaguely remembered that they were poisonous.

Maybe if Sakura had more knowledge of poison, she could have laced the kunai she attacked Koyo with and then he wouldn’t have been able to heal himself, thus wouldn't have had the opportunity to use hurt her—

“Ino-pig-chan,” Sakura called abruptly. “I know this is random, but do you want to study poisons with me?”

Because she would be able to defend herself, she decided, so no one could ever hurt her like that again. 

♟

Ino’s mouth opened in surprise as the pink-haired girl announced her sudden interest in hazardous substances. She didn’t know what to say, so she met her ex-friend’s eyes, trying to gauge her thoughts.

The green orbs she gazed into were distant, as if the girl was in deep thought, but they held a sense of determination and maturity she hadn’t seen in them before.

Warily, Ino glanced at her mother, who’s expression conveyed advice that screamed _say yes it’ll help her deal with the aftermath of the failed mission—_

The blonde nodded unsurely. “Alright,” she affirmed slowly.

Sakura brightened, and Ino’s heart pounded against her chest as she watched her ex-friend smile. She didn’t only look different physically—she was so different in the ways she moved, in the ways she acted.

(Ino decided that she didn’t dislike the Sakura that came back from Wave, but it just wasn’t the same.)

“Okay, Sakura-chan,” Ino’s mother addressed, halting the output of her healing chakra. “It’s done!”

“Thank you, Yamanaka-san!”

Sakura grinned, and it was dazzling.

She met Ino’s gaze head-on. “Ne, Ino, let’s go to the library and look for stuff on poisons!”

Ino scoffed by default. “You’re such a nerd,” she huffed, but then her expression softened. “Fine,” she approved.

Her ex-friend turned to look at Ino’s mother. “Yamanaka-san—Okaa-san, Otou-san, Ino and I are going to eat out at the Dango Shop for dessert! Would you like to join us around 6-o’clock?” she inquired hopefully.

Ino’s mother smiled. “That sounds great, Sakura-chan. I’ll bring Inoichi-kun, too.”

Nodding eagerly, Sakura grabbed Ino’s hand and pulled her out the shop, and the blonde yelled a “bye” over her shoulder, but her eyes were glued on Sakura.

♟

The duo burst into Konoha Library, stumbling into one another because of their momentum, and all heads turned their way. Sakura felt her cheeks heat up at the disapproving looks others gave them due to the noise they made in a public library, hastily untangling herself from Ino.

She glanced at the blonde to assess how she was dealing with the attention. As per always, she was calm and confident, if not a little annoyed at the steady onslaught of glares.

Quietly, the two navigated the genin portion of the building, each wordlessly searching for the section on poisons. Eventually, Sakura found it, and gaped at the sheer number of books in the section.

The studious (or as Ino put it, nerdy) side of her, whom hadn’t emerged since she had been at the academy, cried tears of happiness.

Ino came to her side soon thereafter, and Sakura couldn’t bring herself to look at her, the guilt of worrying the blonde still hovering over her person. Thus, she searched for a starting point to begin her reading.

 _Poisons for Beginners_ was the first text Sakura saw. She picked it up and plopped onto a chair nearby, placing the heavy book on the desk. She saw Ino, who was probably more advanced than her in this area, start up on what she presumed was refreshing her memory on different plants.

 _‘We’d make a killer team,’_ Inner remarked, and Sakura agreed.

Pulling out of her conversation with… herself, Sakura began to read the book:

_“The most experienced experts in poisons can rid an enemy with a single swipe of a weapon, and thus, poisons can be an invaluable tool to shinobi. However, in order to use the tool to its full potential, it is important to understand how it works._

_Poisons are substances that cause a disturbance in living organisms—typically when the body absorbs a sufficient amount, it can cause severe organ damage, usually caused by chemical reaction. These substances can be taken in via ingestion, inhaling its properties or by being absorbed through the skin...”_

She halted suddenly, stopping her reading to stand up; she needed something to take notes on.

Sakura didn’t have a photographic, or even edict memory. Contrary to popular belief, she wasn’t naturally “book smart”, as Kakashi-sensei put it. She had simply trained herself _how_ to study—she had to if she wanted to pass the Academy. After all, her class had seven students from major clans, thus had extra combat training from their relatives.

She knew she wouldn’t have been able to compete with them in anything but theory.

It must have paid off considering she was the only civilian-born in her age group that didn’t get sent to the genin corps.

The girl made her way to the jounin manning the library desk. Awkwardly, she arrived in front of the man as he entered a coughing fit, so Sakura waited patiently. She noticed that he had short brown hair and appeared fairly young based on his generally soft features.

But curiously, his eyes had dark markings underneath them, as if he hadn’t slept well recently.

Sakura wondered if she also sported similar eye bags after depriving herself of sleep for a few weeks because of nightmares.

Once the jounin’s coughing calmed, he spoke, voice raspy. “Yes?” he asked gently.

Sakura bowed her head slightly. “May I please borrow some paper and a writing utensil, shinobi-san?”

“Of course,” he said simply, pulling out a couple of sheets of lined paper and a pen.

She murmured her thanks and went back to study, not noticing the curious stare the tokubetsu jounin, Hayate, was giving the pink-haired girl as she read a book that looked to be half of her body mass.

♟

Ino released an exasperated sigh, blowing her bangs out of the way. It had been an hour and a half, and her head was aching. She refused to read anymore, and she didn’t understand how Sakura remained so focused, meticulously taking notes and devouring the book as if it was food and she was starving.

_Nerd._

“Ugh,” Ino whined, snapping. “I refuse to read anymore—I was supposed to leave all that at the Academy!”

Sakura didn’t even flinch, her mouth pursing into an unimpressed line.

“Why you—” Ino began to bark, offended, but she stopped when Sakura looked up.

“Tell you what,” Sakura began. “I’ll do all the studying, and you can provide the plants from your flower shop!” she chirped. “At this rate, we can get access to basic poisons in a few days, and also start to build immunity together!”

She looked so excited, and it must have been contagious, because Ino also got excited. “That sounds perfect,” she grinned. The blonde paused, before adding, “Forehead.”

Sakura growled. “What did you call me?!” she questioned, raging. “Pig!” she thundered back angrily.

“Forehead!”

“Pig!”

Pause.

They both burst out laughing and didn’t calm until an old lady shushed them angrily from across the library.

♟

The three males of Team 7 just finished giving their report to Hokage-sama. Sasuke remained indifferent throughout the process, if not a little uncomfortable, but Naruto had been especially proud and boastful about the fact that they completed their first C-rank-turned-A-rank mission, and he was already demanding another one.

Kakashi debated reprimanding the boy for his lack of professionalism, but he stopped once he saw Sandaime-sama give Naruto a fond smile, before dismissing the pre-teens.

As soon as the door to the Hokage’s office shut, Hokage-sama sighed. “Where’s the kunoichi, Kakashi?” he asked, referring to Sakura while uncharacteristically pinching the bridge of his nose.

Kakashi rubbed the back of his neck. “I let her skip the mission briefing,” he explained meekly. “She was showing signs of detachment during the mission, so I decided it would be healthier for her mental well-being to be with her parents.”

Sandaime-sama nodded, before closing his eyes and leaning back into his chair. “Their first C-rank, and already, everything failed spectacularly,” he mumbled to no one in particular. Then, he promptly sat up. “How is she doing?”

“As good as can be expected.”

“Ah.”

Kakashi remained silent, before asking, “Has Iwagakure initiated contact with us yet?”

Hokage-sama shook his head. “No, not yet,” he said. “But I imagine they will soon when they hear that the infamous Copy Ninja was in the same area as their shinobi, who’d be considered missing in action.”

“This could prove to be problematic,” Kakashi summed up.

“Indeed.”

A moment of silence hung in the room.

“Well, Kakashi,” Sandaime-sama began. “Go home and rest, but I’m expecting a written report on my desk within two days. Also, remain attentive—I’ll contact you if the situation with Iwagakure begins to escalate.”

“Yes, Hokage-sama,” Kakashi bowed. 

♟

Once done researching for the day, Sakura and Ino stopped by her house, where she dropped off the books she checked out, two on poisons, and one on basic genjutsu theory—she couldn’t help herself, her curiosity peeking as her inner-paper-ninja emerged.

It was almost as if the duo never stopped being friends. As Sakura went to shower, she left the door of her bathroom creaked open slightly, and they talked incessantly about miscellaneous things.

When Sakura exited, she was dressed in a plain white T-shirt and black sweats. Ino didn’t comment on the lack of style, but humorously tried to remove the disapproving stare from her face.

(She failed.)

Glancing at the clock, Sakura estimated that her parents would arrive in a few minutes, and lo and behold, they did. Greeting them excitedly, the two girls and the Haruno couple departed to Sakura’s favorite amnistu place, Ino vaguely mentioning that her parents would meet them there.

Sakura could immediately sense how her mother and father tensed at the notion of the Yamanakas joining them, and almost cringed with the realization that she messed up.

 _‘We shouldn’t have invited Yamanaka-san to eat with us,’_ Inner emphasized unhappily.

 _‘But how could I_ not _invite them?’_ Sakura shot back. _‘Yamanaka-san treated our wounds for free! I…I have manners, you know?’_

Inner didn’t reply, and thus, she decided she won the argument with herself by default.

As they entered the restaurant, Ino spotted her parents sitting in a corner, and waved enthusiastically. The pair waved back, and anxiously, Sakura glanced at her mother and father. They briefly gave each other this look that she couldn’t decipher, before smiling politely and walking towards the other married couple.

Everybody sat down. Sakura, while ordering and eating her amnitsu, listened quietly to Ino complain about how absolutely insatiable her sensei, Asuma-sensei, was. She said he was always pushing her and her team to their limits—apparently, Team 10 was learning basic jutsu for their individual chakra natures.

Sakura didn’t even know her chakra nature, she realized, and something told her that Kakashi-sensei wouldn’t tell her any time soon.

She stopped paying attention after Ino began to whine about Shikamaru being lazy and Chōji’s complete lack of dietary restrain. Instead, the girl opted to eves-drop on the adults, who were talking politely to one another.

However, it didn’t escape Sakura that although Ino’s mother and father were completely relaxed, hers were tense.

Sakura knew vaguely that her parents never felt comfortable around Ino’s parents—although they were nothing besides civil and well-mannered, the front didn’t fool her, because she could feel _it_ brewing in the surface; her mother and father felt inferior to the Yamanaka head family.

Her parents felt lower than the Yamanakas because of her father’s “career-genin” label. Sakura wondered if such an inferiority complex ran in the family, because despite how much she cared for Ino, she also felt that way.

Shaking it off, Sakura finished her dessert and pushed her plate away. She turned to Ino. “Pig, how do you figure out your chakra nature anyways?” she asked curiously.

Ino scrunched her nose up. “Well, Sensei gave us some paper that we had to put some of our chakra into,” she explained. “He told us that the reactions would tell us our nature. For example, mine got wet, meaning I have a water nature.”

“Ah,” Sakura hummed, trying to hide her peeking interest. “Where do you get such paper?” she questioned.

“Sensei bought it from a weapon’s shop,” Ino replied, bored.

 _‘We should go pick it up,_ ’ Inner encouraged, and Sakura agreed. She resolved that she would claim the pay from the mission to Wave tomorrow morning. Then, she would restock on weaponry, because she never again wanted to touch any of the kunai she owned, despite still having a few since Tobi had collected them and stuffed them into her pouch.

(Said weaponry included the violating kunai and the blades she used to kill the Iwa-nin with, which was why she decided she desperately needed new ones.)

♟

When she got home, Sakura stood in front of the body-length mirror in her room, bare of clothing and hair, reaching out to touch the right side of her head.

She didn’t recognize herself behind the lack of hair, she realized. She felt like a different person.

Or maybe truth was—

She took a sharp breath as her thoughts stirred, chewing her lip.

—that this was who Sakura really was, and always had been behind the layers of clothes and hair.

Sighing, the girl threw on her pajamas. She could hear her parents whispering through the thin walls of her room, but their conversation wasn’t comprehensible, so eventually, Sakura laid down on her bed.

She tried hard to stay still, really, but then her fingers began to itch as thoughts about Tobi hit her full-force. The weight of the situation finally hit her.

She couldn’t believe she had accepted an apprenticeship (if it could even be called that) under a missing nin; she committed treason, and the reality of the fact that she technically betrayed Konoha began to sink in.

It just felt like such a good idea at the time, being offered the resources to defend herself. 

Could she still tell someone and get ahead of the situation? No, she knew she couldn’t tell Kakashi-sensei because he’d have to tell the Hokage, who would probably force her through investigation at T&I, something she knew she couldn’t possibly survive.

She knew she would also receive a lengthy sentence for her crimes. After all, despite her age, she was now considered an adult because of her genin status, and without a clan backing her up, her punishment would be unavoidable.

Panic began to affect her body, because her hands were shaking as she sat up on her bed.

 _‘Relax,’_ Inner told her _. ‘It’s not that bad... he’ll probably forget about us soon anyways. It’s not like Tobi can even get inside the village walls as a rogue-nin, right?’_

 _‘Right,’_ Sakura agreed, albeit unsurely. _‘Breaking into the village would be too much trouble for an unremarkable thirteen-year-old girl.’_

Her eyes snapped to the book on genjutsu on her nightstand.

 _‘But maybe he was right, about me learning genjutsu,’_ Sakura thought warily. _‘If I know some, maybe I’ll be able to defend myself better next time, so no one can hurt us like Koyo did.’_

Inner didn’t say it, but she felt the approval from within.

Getting up, Sakura grabbed the book on basic genjutsu theory and plopped on to the seat of her study table. She pulled out an old notebook and began to get to work, reviewing what she already knew from survival training at the Academy.

_“Genjutsu specialists are few and in between, but they remain some of the most feared people in the shinobi world for their ability to manipulate the chakra flow of a target’s Nervous System, and thus convince the senses of things that aren’t really there, such as false visions, sounds, smells, tastes and touches._

_Most genjutsu specialists have near-perfect chakra control; the better the chakra control is, the better the illusion is. Typically, advanced intelligence is also a prerequisite to the quality of the genjutsu...”_

♟

It was a little past midnight when Sakura finished reading the genjutsu book in its entirety, her journal full of hand-written notes.

Her interest in illusions was suddenly peeking, and she continued to make mental connections between everything she learned and prior knowledge. She finally realized that the technique Sensei used on her during the infamous bell test was the Hell-Viewing Technique.

 _‘Took us long enough,’_ Inner scoffed, and Sakura scowled.

Realistically, she knew that the only person on her team who might fall for genjutsu would be Naruto. She read about the Sharingan, and she knew that it was essentially immune to most illusions, meaning it would be futile against Kakashi-sensei and perhaps Sasuke-kun.

But Sakura didn’t care; she only wanted to learn enough genjutsu to make sure that she could defend herself, so no one could hurt her again the way Koyo did.

Exhausted, Sakura lay down on her bed, mind not ready to doze off, but body incapable of moving from sleep-deprivation. Eventually, without her permission, she felt herself get sucked into her dreams.

When Sakura’s eyes shot open a couple hours later, she was screaming, and tears were leaking from her sockets. She took a moment to assess her surroundings, seeing her parents barging into her room, and although it took a moment, she finally realized that it was just a dream of Kafu and Koyo.

She met her father’s gaze. His eyes held understanding as he opened himself for a hug, and soon, she was wrapping her arms around him, wailing into his T-shirt. Her mother stroked her hair and rocked her back and forth as her father told her he knew what it was like, but she’d get through it, because she was strong.

She wanted to tell him that she wasn't strong, her weakness seeping into her being like poison.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ Next chapter, introducing Sakura's developing friendship with Tenten and rocky relationship with Naruto, Sasuke and Kakashi-sensei! Hayate also notice the strange pink-haired girl holed up in the library, and Yūgao stops by the library!  
> ✿ Can girls with pixie cuts/short hair relate with assumptions/jokes about liking girls? I'm bi so it's whatever but it was a regular occurrence when I had a pixie XD  
> ✿ I tried to portray Sakura's parents like in Road to Ninja - don't-know-their-limits, embarrassing, but they mean well. Did I get it right?  
> ✿ What do you think about Ino and Sakura studying poisons together?


	6. Rejection (In Addition to Weapons)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Land of Keys is mentioned here - it's an anime-only nation. It's village, Jōmae Village (Lock Village) specializes in espionage and information-gathering. I thought it was an interesting concept :)

the cruel fuel to the fire holds nothing but sadistic desire.

♟

**Konoha, April 7**

The next morning, Sakura woke up on her bed in between her parents, feeling content and refreshed, both of them hugging her tightly.

She didn't want to leave them; she felt safe in their presence, like she was a child, not a shinobi.

(What did it mean to be a shinobi, anyways? Kakashi-sensei reckoned it was a ploy by destiny to turn people into tools; her mother thought it was a way to secure pay; her father decided it was a way to gain respect—but what did Sakura think?

To her, being a shinobi didn't have a reason. She just was one.)

Despite how safe she felt, however, a glance at the clock told her it was time to get up if she wanted to work on her developing understanding of genjutsu and poisons, as well as re-stocking on weapons.

It was already 7AM, and she had things to do, and places to go.

Tip-toeing, Sakura untangled herself from her parents and made her way to the restroom, freshening up and changing into a T-shirt and a pair of tights. She coupled the look with a red jacket, the color being her favorite, and pulled the hood over her head as she picked up her books and notes.

(She wasn't ashamed of her hair because it made her look masculine, she told herself, but even she knew it was a lie. Inner didn't even have to chime in to remind her.)

She placed everything in a book bag before quietly leaving her two-story house, grabbing her wallet and a banana on her way out.

Sakura began to make her way to the Academy, where the mission assignment desk was located. Hesitantly, she entered the room, and saw six chunin manning the desk.

One of them was her sensei from the Academy.

"Good morning, Sakura," Iruka-sensei greeted warmly as she approached him, halting whatever paperwork he was doing.

Sakura smiled widely as she walked towards him. "Good morning, Iruka-sensei!" she exclaimed, happy to see the familiar face.

"How can I help you?"

She suddenly felt very shy. "Well... I'm here to pick up the pay from our last mission, from Wave." 

Nodding, Sensei asked for her registration number.

"012601," she recited mechanically as Iruka-sensei shifted through some drawers.

"Ah-ha," he mumbled, pulling out an envelope.

His eyes bulged when he skimmed the report of their mission.

"I thought the mission was only C-rank?!" he raged.

Sakura sweat-dropped. "It was..." she began. "But then we ran into some unpleasant people..."

Iruka-sensei's brow pinched in horror as he began to ask questions about Naruto's well-being, like whether he was injured or how he was dealing with the situation, and Sakura could barely keep up.

At the end, she simply said, "He was okay on our way back here..."

Pause.

"It was hard on him, but he'll get through it," she re-assured Sensei. "In fact, I think it only made him stronger—not just physically, but mentally, too."

Sighing, Iruka-sensei nodded solemnly, before pulling out money from the envelope. Sakura's eyes widened as she saw the large bills; the money she earned was as much as what her father earned after three C-ranked missions!

Iruka-sensei smiled at her enthusiasm, and he was soon handing the pay to her.

Thanking him profusely, Sakura left, wishing him luck with his new students back at the Academy. Pocketing the pay, she exited the building and hastily made her way to the place she knew Sasuke-kun bought all his weapons from: Ninja Tools Mantendo.

(How did she know this? Well, she followed him there a few times, of course!)

As Sakura entered the weapon's shop, she saw a brown-haired girl about her age behind the counter, twirling a kunai on her finger. They made eye-contact, and the girl smiled, which Sakura returned warily.

She began to look around, but she didn't really know where to start; her father typically bought all her equipment.

"Hi, I'm Tenten. I work here part-time," the brown-haired girl said from behind her. "Do you need any help?"

Sakura rubbed the back of her neck. "Well, I'm looking to, let's say...um...start anew and restock my weaponry completely," she explained.

Pause.

"But...I don't really know where to begin," Sakura admitted, defeated.

The girl—Tenten—brightened. She took long strides to the middle of the shop. "Well, I would recommend at least two-dozen kunai, a dozen shuriken and two coils of ninja wire," Tenten explained, while simultaneously pulling out the equipment she mentioned.

Tenten moved to another section of the shop, and Sakura followed.

"Also, a few senbon are always effective, as well as at least ten explosive tags," she detailed, pulling out said items. She then placed three balls wrapped in yellow tape into the pile of items. "Smoke bombs also help with sticky situations," she elaborated vaguely.

Sakura momentarily wondered if she was getting scammed, because this was triple the number of weapons she already owned—

—but then she recalled that Kakashi-sensei always seemed to have an endless amount of kunai...

Sakura nodded. "That sounds great, Tenten-san," she expressed. Then, she frowned. "But how do I fit all _that_ into a single weapon's pouch?"

Tenten grinned, before picking up a pouch from a shelf nearby. It was brown in color, and twice as big as the one she had at home. "This should be able to carry a large part of it," the girl told her.

She then pulled out a scroll from the same shelf.

"The rest can be sealed into a summoning scroll," Tenten informed her. "You can keep this in a pocket somewhere, or even in the pouch."

Sakura's eyes widened in understanding. "Wow," she murmured, recalling the lessons on fūinjutsu from the Academy (which, although brief, explained the theory well enough). She brightened. "Thank you so much!"

Tenten smiled proudly. "If you want, I can show you how to seal and summon things right now? It's really easy."

When Sakura nodded eagerly, Tenten pulled out her own scroll from her pocket.

"To release the item, you disrupt the chakra flow of the seal and picture the weapon," she said, before murmuring, "Fūinjutsu: Kai!"

Sakura noted how release was similar to genjutsu, and she witnessed a kunai pop into existence out of nowhere, amazed.

"To seal it, you should copy this on to your scroll beforehand," Tenten continued to explain, briefly showing Sakura the symbol on her own scroll. "The language of fūinjutsu is complex, but this works for the rough size of the weapons you'll seal."

Sakura quickly memorized it, before picking up the scroll she was going to purchase. Tenten then handed her an ink quill, and Sakura copied the symbol.

"Now, you make the guiding hand sign," Tenten explained. "Return!" she breathed.

Sakura watched in awe as the weapon disappeared.

 _'Awesome, shannaro!'_ Inner cried.

Tenten grinned. "Now you try!"

Warily, Sakura nodded, bringing her fingers to make the hand sign for tiger. "Return!" she mimicked, but she let out a huff of annoyance when it didn't work.

She tried again, this time focusing her attention on a single kunai.

"Return!"

It worked, she realized, grinning madly.

"That's so cool!" she exclaimed. She faced the girl that helped her. "Thank you so much!"

Tenten grinned. "That's my job," she said modestly.

"I'm Haruno Sakura," she introduced herself, while simultaneously releasing the kunai from the scroll, murmuring a "kai".

"Nice to meet you, Sakura-san," Tenten said pleasantly. "I graduated from the Academy last year—I'm from Team Gai."

Sakura nodded her acknowledgment, even though she had never heard of this Gai person. "I just graduated four months ago," she said. "I'm from Team 7, or Team Kakashi."

Tenten's eyes widened, before a toothy smile made its way to her face. She began to giggle uncontrollably, before calming. "Sorry," she apologized, "It's just my sensei's always going on about how your sensei is his 'eternal rival'—I mean, what are the chances we'd meet like this?"

Sakura tilted her head in confusion. She had never heard of this rivalry, but then she realized that she barely knew anything about Kakashi-sensei besides his name, his inappropriate obsession with erotica and his chronic lateness.

She didn't even know what his face looked like, so...

She giggled. "Well, I guess that makes us the mediators," Sakura said playfully.

Tenten grinned. "I guess it does," she parroted.

Sakura suddenly remembered something. "Oh—do you have this paper that tells you about your chakra nature? I'd like to discover mine."

"You mean litmus paper?" Tenten asked, brow furrowed. Sakura nodded unsurely, so Tenten made an affirming motion, before turning around and searching through another shelf.

Once she found what she was looking for, she handed Sakura a small piece of paper.

"It's on the house," Tenten-san beamed.

Sakura's eyes widened. "T-thank you," she sputtered.

Holding the paper in the palm of her hand, Sakura sent chakra to the surface. For a few moments, nothing happened, but just as she was about to give up, the paper became slightly damp, before crumbling to the ground.

"That means you have an affinity leaning towards earth, as well as a minor affinity of water," Tenten told her, visibly perplexed. Sakura didn't understand why at the time, because she didn't realize that most genin only had one affinity.

She grinned. "Wow, thank you so much!" Sakura exclaimed. She then glanced at all the supplies, frowning. "How much does it all cost?"

She braced herself for a large number as Tenten calculated the worth of the equipment, preparing mentally to give up all the money she earned from her mission to Wave.

However, she was pleasantly surprised to hear that her purchases were worth only a small portion of her savings.

Silently relieved, Sakura opened her wallet and placed the required money, plus a tip, on the desk as Tenten sealed half of her equipment into the scroll, and then proceeded to secure the scroll and remaining weaponry into her new pouch.

Gratefully, Sakura grabbed the pouch and secured it on her thigh, just like her old one.

She smiled at the brown-haired girl in front of her. It was returned brightly.

"See you around, Sakura?"

Sakura's smile turned into a grin at the promise.

She re-adjusted her hood, before turning to leave the shop.

"Yeah," Sakura replied, heading to her next destination, the library. "See you around, Tenten."

♟

Hayate was not enjoying his assignment.

Of course, he would never say that out loud because he respected the decisions made by Hokage-sama, but, to be fair, the library was not where most people wanted to spend such a large portion of their day.

A few nights ago, Hayate came back from a B-rank mission to the Land of Keys. They were assigned to escort four governmental officials to the border of the nation, and they were not permitted to cross into the foreign territory, which wasn't surprising considering Key's hidden village was called Jōmae, literally meaning "Locked" Village. 

The mission was easy enough. His team, made up by three chunin he knew in passing and himself as the captain, came across some bandits on the way to the destination—but it was nothing they couldn't handle with relative ease.

On the way back, however, his team was attacked by a group of rogue-nin. They were weak; lower-level chunin at most, but he was caught by surprise.

Because of his careless mistake, his youngest subordinate, a Hyuga in her mid-teens, paid with her life. The rogues were after her eyes, Hayate had realized, before he killed them all.

Hokage-sama pulled him off the mission roster after that and placed him on library duty for the week, deeming that he needed to "focus on his mental health".

Hayate decided that his mental health was only getting worse, because the only entertainment around was reading, which he didn't particularly enjoy.

He glanced at a table in the corner of the library. That kid from yesterday was there again; she had shown up at least four hours ago and had remained glued to her spot, nose buried deep in multiple books. The topics of her readings ranged from poisons and chemical reactions, to genjutsu theory and functions of the brain. 

It was a peculiar sight.

He felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up abruptly. It was Yūgao, and he allowed himself to relax once he recognized her. She smiled playfully. "Did I scare you?" she questioned, smirking as she pushed a strand of hair behind her ear.

Slowly, he nodded as he stood up. "I was terrified, ANBU-chan," he drawled teasingly.

"You should be," she said seriously, before bursting into an uncharacteristic giggle, a side of her only he saw.

As per always, Yūgao looked breathtaking, her rosy lips glossed over and purple bangs framing her face. His arms snaked around her waist, and he buried his face into the crook of her neck.

"Hayate!" she scolded, becoming as embarrassed as she always was with public displays of affection. 

He ignored her complaint. "My shift's almost done," he stated simply. "Do you want to grab dinner?"

He felt her nod. "Sure," she murmured. "Meet you in an hour at home? We'll head out together."

"Yeah," Hayate affirmed, before squeezing her hand. She squeezed back, untangled herself from him, and then turned around to leave.

♟

Sakura knew it was slightly creepy, but she couldn't look away as the jounin manning the desk (the same one from the day before) hugged the purple-haired woman tightly.

She was a sucker for love and a hopeless romantic, and god, the scene was the pinnacle of all the romance books she's ever read combined (and she had read _a lot_ ).

Maybe one day she'd be hugged like that by Sasuke-kun—

With the thought of her crush came the thought of Team 7, and realization suddenly hit her; they were supposed to meet for training at 10-O'clock! With anxieties attacking her full-force, she glanced at the time, only to realize that she was late.

She completely forgot about Team 7.

"Ugh!" she hissed under her breath, uncaring of the un-ladylikeness of it. She grabbed all the books under her name, hastily stuffed them into her bag, and then ran like she never ran before, all the while mentally cursing the jounin at the check-out desk for giving an amused look at her misery.

♟

Sakura zeroed in on to the training ground, panting, and hoped to the gods that it wasn't the day Kakashi-sensei chose to forget about his chronic lateness—

Of course, Kakashi-sensei had to be there, sitting against a tree and reading his porn, not a care in the world. She registered that the boys were sparring to her right, trading blows and insults.

Sensei looked up. He arched an eyebrow. "You're two hours late," he told her simply.

Her cheeks burned up as Sasuke-kun spared her a glance, only to receive an uppercut to the face. "Sorry, Sensei!" she cried. "You see, I was at the libra—"

"Don't care," he cut her off, raising his hand up. "Ten laps."

Her breath hitched. "I just ran all the way here from the—!"

"Hm... No, let's make it twenty."

Eyes widening, she opened her mouth again. "But—"

"I said," he started eerily, closing his book and meeting her gaze, "thirty laps."

Sakura's face threatened to twitch, first with fear at the sheer number of rounds she'd have to complete, but then anger began to brew in the pit of her stomach, bubbling over to her mouth. Nonetheless, she kept a polite facade on, nodding agreeably.

As she began her run, her Inner threw a bucket of colorful words at their sensei.

 _'Hypocritical-pain-in-the-ass-motherfucker!'_ Inner roared, causing her vessel to wince. _'Who does he think he is, anyways, punishing_ us _when_ he's _the one who's always late?!'_

Sakura couldn't help but agree.

♟

Tears were rolling down her cheeks.

It was pathetic, really. She was on her seventeenth lap, and Sakura was certain she was actually dying because everything hurt, from her legs to her arms to her stomach to her chest and even to her goddamn _face_.

She had discarded her red hoodie about two laps ago, unable to stand the warmth pooling across her body, and uncaring about her hair (or lack thereof) being out in the open. Sweat stuck uncomfortably to her top, pants and undergarments, and she was positive her face was flushed (and not in the attractive way).

"Thirteen more to go," cheered Kakashi-sensei as she passed by him, but it completely lacked enthusiasm, and she let out a strangled sob.

Typically, for a warm-up, Sakura only did five laps around the training grounds, which was the approximate distance they did in the Academy since Kakashi-sensei never specified how many she should have been doing.

Sakura never bothered to count how many laps her male teammates were doing, either, since the amount increased every day because of their competitive nature, so her efforts would have been fruitless.

Instead, she sat back and watched the grass grow as Naruto and Sasuke-kun finished their runs.

It seemed that her lack of stamina training and conditioning was coming back to bite her.

Sakura reached her twentieth round before crashing down to her knees in front of Kakashi-sensei, Sasuke-kun, and that idiot, Naruto. They were eating lunch, and Sakura wished she ate more than a stupid banana for breakfast. 

"Sakura," Kakashi-sensei said, smiling ironically. "Get up before I extend it to forty laps."

Her eyes widened as Naruto opened his mouth. "Kakashi-sensei stop torturing Sakura-ch—!" he raged angrily, but she cut him off.

"Don't provoke him, idiot!" she cried, before scrambling to her feet.

She ran into the other direction again, but her knees were trembling and threatening to give out. She risked a glance at Sasuke-kun, who was fairly indifferent, but she could see the unimpressed glint in his eyes.

He was looking down on her.

No, she couldn't and wouldn't let him look at her like _that_! She had to be strong enough for him!

Sakura found the last of her willpower, wiping away the snot that accumulated on her face from her uncontrollable crying. Breaking into a final run, she pushed herself through two more laps.

' _WE CAN DO THIS, SHANNARO!_ ' Inner roared.

Soon, Sakura was at twenty-three laps, and then twenty-five and then twenty-nine and then thirty and she froze in front of the tree, about to release a cry of victory—

She felt a sudden drop in her blood pressure.

Clutching her head, all she saw was a gray blur catching her before she hit the ground.

♟

When she came to moments later, she was face down in the dirt.

"—kura-chan!" howled someone. Naruto, she vaguely realized. "Hey, are you okay?"

Groaning, Sakura got to her knees, only to be met by a dazzling blue.

She never realized that Naruto's eyes were so... _blue_? Bluer than the sky, perhaps.

She grunted. "I'm fine," she assured forcefully, getting up to her feet, only to fall back down to her knees.

"Ne, I think I pushed a little too hard too soon, huh?" Kakashi-sensei mused from her left, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly.

"Ya _think_?!" Naruto raged.

His eye crinkled. "But I thought you could handle it," he began thoughtfully, tone carefully impassive, but holding a barely detectable condescending undertone. "You know, considering Naruto does at least thirty _every day_." 

Sakura's mouth fell. That idiot, Naruto, the class clown and deadlast of the Academy (who failed the graduation exam three times, by the way), was doing better than her in stamina training by literal _miles_ ; she couldn't believe it!

Hastily, she scanned her surroundings in search for Sasuke-kun, only to see him judging her even more than before, and angrily she turned to glare at Naruto for making her appear weak in comparison, and the blond visibly flinched—

She stood up and stomped to the tree Kakashi-sensei was at earlier, sitting down, brooding moodily.

There was an awkward moment of silence before Sensei coughed.

"Right, Naruto, Sasuke," he addressed. "Resume your spar."

♟

Sakura really couldn't believe it.

Sasuke-kun was actually _trying_ against that idiot, Naruto! The blond had created a good twenty shadow clones, and although he had no technique, going head-on into battle, the clones wouldn't stop coming and were already overwhelming Sasuke-kun.

Her anger reached another level, and it was clear to her that Naruto was better than her.

Well, she could always drag him into an alleyway and beat him up, she thought.

She considered the options, and weighed the pros and cons, before deciding against it—it would be a cheap win, because he wouldn't fight back. However, if her assumptions were correct, Naruto had no knowledge about genjutsu, and now would be the perfect time to test out the results of her studying...

Without thinking twice, Sakura discreetly made the snake hand sign, making sure through her peripheral vision that Sensei was focused on his book, not on her. She scanned all the Naruto clones, trying to figure out which one was the real thing; it didn't take that long since Sasuke-kun caused all three of the clones to disperse with a single shuriken.

(She mentally cooed because he was so _AWESOME_!)

She had to have perfect control in order to disrupt someone else's chakra flow, Sakura figured. She was in a short enough range to cast the first layer of the Hell-Viewing Technique, one of the few jutsu scrolls she had access to as a genin, and carefully, she sent her chakra to him. It was difficult, and sweat was dripping off her forehead, but she focused on searching for his hippocampus with her chakra, then moved to the frontal portion of the temporal lobe.

She soon found his amygdalae.

(At least she hoped it was his amygdalae. It _felt_ like the diagram she memorized, but she wasn't certain...)

The amygdalae were connected to the emotion of fear, as she learned from her readings—it was the part of the brain this jutsu affected. 

Smiling privately at her accomplishment, she created the rat hand sign and finished off the jutsu, mouthing the name of the technique.

It worked, if only momentarily. She could picture the additional layers of leaves that bombarded Naruto, catching him off-guard. She knew based on experience that in a few moments, he would witness his worst fear in front of his eyes and he wouldn't know how to break out of a genjutsu because he never paid attention in class—

Her illusion was shattered by a harsh kick Sasuke-kun delivered to Naruto's chest, breaking the genjutsu through physical pain.

Her Inner fumed. ' _WHAT?!'_ her other personality cried, dumbfounded. _'BUT WE WORKED SO HARD TO CAST IT!'_

Inner's anger was showing on her vessel's face.

♟

Kakashi discreetly watched his pink-haired student's eyebrows scrunch up into a furious expression from under the disguise of reading Icha Icha. He had just witnessed her perform a genjutsu (albeit a mere D-rank) on her teammate, and he was confused as to where she picked it up from, because he hadn't taught it to her.

What really piqued his interest, however, was her method of performance.

He had seen her eyes scan over Naruto's head with deep concentration, and he could tell immediately what she was doing, because Kurenai did the same thing; Sakura was searching for the chakra pathways of her target's brain, a step common only in genjutsu specialists.

Most people, including himself, only made the hand signs and directed the chakra to the brain, hoping for the best, but Sakura had precision and technique. It was a skill that could make the illusion much stronger.

He placed his hand on her shoulder, causing her to turn around and glance at him. He could tell that Sakura figured out that she had just been caught red-handed, as her mouth morphed into an O-shape.

"Maa, that wasn't very nice to Naruto, Sakura," he lamented.

She bit her lip nervously, an embarrassed blush staining her cheeks. "Sensei, I—"

Kakashi cut her off. "Where did you learn that from?" he questioned dryly.

Sakura gulped, looking to the ground. "Well, I've been spending a lot of time in the library..." she trailed off.

He didn't plan on teaching her more than how to break out of an illusion for a few months; he wanted his team to simply enjoy their genin days, because they were children, and they shouldn't have to worry about honing their skills, because they had time to grow up, unlike his team, who were in the middle of a war—

At least he thought they had time, but it was clear to him that his students were advancing without his guidance at rapid rates. He knew vaguely that Sasuke was privately perfecting his Sharingan, Naruto was practicing his hand-to-hand combat, and he now realized that Sakura was delving into genjutsu.

Although he'd never openly admit it, he was now concerned for the well-being of his students, who were practicing techniques without his guidance—especially Sakura.

He was worried that if she practiced illusions alone, she could trap herself into a genjutsu and be stuck in it until someone broke her out; Kurenai had done that when they were in the Academy, and her fear of spiders had only amplified to the point that she'd break into tears every time she saw one for years.

 _That_ would be something troublesome to deal with.

Kakashi sighed dejectedly. "It's okay," he assured her, and Sakura relaxed. "But never practice alone," he added sternly. "If you want to test out something, come to me and _only_ me," he emphasized his order, seriousness lacing his words.

She nodded frantically.

He stood up and stretched, before intercepting a punch Naruto was sending Sasuke's way.

"Hey?!" Naruto exclaimed. "What gives?! I was just about to beat the bastard—"

"As if, loser," Sasuke huffed.

Kakashi smiled as they glared at each other. "Now, that's enough training for the day," he asserted. "Come on, let's gather up."

Reluctantly complying, they all made their way to the tree Sakura was at, and they sat down in a circle. He warily surveyed all his students, before sighing.

"From tomorrow onwards, I'm giving you all an hour of individual training every session."

There was a pause, as if the kids couldn't believe it.

Then, Naruto stood up to his feet and raised his arms above his head in victory, his grin reaching miles, Sakura's eyes positively _shone_ , and even Sasuke's lips twitched into a ghost of a smile.

If he knew he'd get reactions like this, he would have done this from the start.

"I'll be working with Naruto on giving him a solid base in regards to strategizing and chakra control, Sakura on her genjutsu and increasing her chakra reserves, and Sasuke on using his Sharingan."

Sakura looked momentarily surprised at the mention of Sasuke’s Sharingan, something she didn’t know he had, before joining her teammates in nodding eagerly.

Kakashi smiled under his mask. "Good. Tomorrow at eight, we'll start. You're all dismissed."

♟

Sakura couldn't stop grinning, even as Naruto made a mad dash for Ichiraku's to celebrate, yelling something about how Iruka-sensei had to treat him to ramen now. Neither she nor Sasuke-kun got up; she stayed seated because her legs were physically aching, but she couldn't decipher why he wasn't going home.

 _'Now's our chance to make a move!'_ cried Inner, and ecstasy at the thought of being alone with her crush (plus Kakashi-sensei, but he didn't really count) hit her like a brick as she threw on her jacket.

As if on cue, he began to stand up to leave. Eyes widening, Sakura got to her feet and stumbled after him.

"Sasuke-kun!" she exclaimed, following him hurriedly. "Wait for me!"

He glanced at her from over his shoulder expectantly.

Shyly, Sakura looked to the ground, brows pinched up with nerves and cheeks tinted with a blush. "Hey... how about..." she began to ask him for a date, before rephrasing her question. "Why don't we spend time on improving our teamwork together?" she asked sweetly.

Sasuke-kun definitely wouldn't reject that offer, she decided.

His eyebrows scrunched up slightly—it was a minuscule movement, but Sakura had gotten better at reading him recently.

Sasuke-kun's expression was the coldest she had seen since the day they were placed on a team together. 

"You're just like Naruto," he said, a hint of annoyance in his voice.

Inner faltered angrily at being compared to _him_.

"If you have time to spend on me, why don't you practice a jutsu?" he questioned. He began to turn back around, glancing at her through his peripheral vision. "To tell you frankly, your abilities are less than Naruto's."

And then he just turned around and walked away.

Sakura watched in despair as he got further from her reach, his words weighing down her spirit and completely obliterating her self-worth. All she could think about was how he was right because she truly was useless, their mission to Wave being a primary example of said lack of abilities.

Dully, she noted that Sasuke-kun had been unusually cruel—she didn't know what she did to set off such an intense reaction.

Tears began to roll down her cheeks. Warily, she turned around, only to catch Kakashi-sensei shunshin away, leaving behind nothing but smoke to indicate his presence.

Her left eye twitched; she bet that Ino's sensei would have comforted her, instead of awkwardly poof-ing away because he was afraid of emotional teenage girls!

Angrily, Sakura stomped home, tears still dripping down her chin pathetically.

♟

Kizashi was sitting on the couch and sharpening some ninja tools when his daughter came through the door, body drenched in dried sweat and face red from crying.

His heart turned painfully in his chest.

"Sa-chan!" he called worriedly, getting up. He bent down to her level. "What happened?"

Her lips wobbled. "Sasuke-kun..." she started, before breaking down into tears.

His face softened. Kizashi knew who this Sasuke was; Sakura had brought up his name whenever the subject of her genin team came up, and it was glaringly obvious that she was infatuated with the boy.

He brought his daughter into a hug and let her cry it out. This was usually Mebuki's thing, but since she was away, his comfort would have to suffice.

Kizashi smiled reassuringly as she pulled away from his embrace. She wiped away her tears stubbornly, and he could tell she was feeling better, if only a bit.

Sakura sighed. "Papa," she started, voice suddenly becoming happier as if she just remembered something great.

Kizashi realized that she hadn't called him Papa since she was five-years-old.

"I got my pay from Wave back!" she exclaimed ecstatically.

Then she handed her earnings to him.

Kizashi's eyes widened; he couldn't possibly accept the money his thirteen-year-old daughter earned for her first major mission—

—or so he thought he couldn't accept the money, but then he recalled that he was already one day late on rent. He smiled gratefully before pocketing the pay.

He'd have to feel guilty about it later. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ Please note that the next chapter will begin to deal with themes such as suicide.  
> ✿ Hayate and Yūgao will become recurring characters really soon! Tobi will also be becoming a recurring character around chapter 8.  
> ✿ Sakura's kind of rude to Naruto and obsessed with Sasuke - I know it can be annoying, but I didn't want her character to change so suddenly, because that would be a reach, I think.  
> ✿ The way Sasuke rejected her is canon; if you recall, he did it right before the chunin exams. However, I decided to push it backwards because cause-and-effect made him react harshly faster (and we'll find out later what the cause for his outburst was).


	7. Father and Daughter; Failures

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: GRAPHIC DEPICTION OF SUICIDE, WHICH WILL BE A RECURRING THEME. Please don't read any further if this makes you uncomfortable.
> 
> Suicide Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255

incompetent and incoherent, he grit his teeth, desiring to meet Death prematurely.

♟

**Konoha, April 7**

Her legs were killing her, but she felt pure, freshly showered and dressed in a nightgown. She tried her hardest not to think of Sasuke-kun; she was under the impression that their relationship was going somewhere since he treated her almost _kindly_ in Wave.

It was as if he did a complete 180 as soon as they came back to Konoha, because even before the harsh rejection, the little contact she had with Sasuke-kun these few days was met by a slightly bitter glance.

What did she do so _wrong_?

Sakura shifted into the fetal position. Although her father had tried to comfort her earlier, it just wasn't the same as her mother.

Mama—she had left a note on her desk saying that she was on her way to Kusagakure for work.

That would make it a little over a week until they would see each other again.

Sakura sighed. Because of her father's genin status, his income alone wouldn't support the family, even if he took consistent C-ranked missions.

In order to accommodate, her mother, an Academy drop-out, took on a job as a merchant. Her parents wanted her to have a comfortable life, so they tried really hard, giving up their time with one another so she could live in a nice house and have nice clothes.

On top of that, her father was drowning in debt because the Academy had been so unbelievably expensive. He had taken loan after loan _after loan_.

Sometimes, Sakura felt guilty, so she gave most of the money she earned on missions to her parents—after all, it was the debt of _her_ education they were trying to pay.

Other times, however, she was bitter, because although her parents cared, they weren't _really_ there. They were always traveling; they weren't even in the village to congratulate her when she graduated to genin, her parents coming back from Tea Country and Kumogakure a day too late.

It wasn't irregular to not see either of them for two weeks at a time. Instead, the neighbor and landlord, Kuroyagi-san, dropped by every day to check on her after she came back from the Academy.

Eventually, her thoughts went back to Sasuke-kun, where they lingered more often than not. To her, he symbolized her worth as a woman and offered a future of being a part of a respected shinobi clan.

She was also in love with the boy, so there was that.

Her thoughts landed on Naruto. She began to feel a bit guilty about almost sucking him into a cruel genjutsu—she took it too far, she realized.

(But of course, she won't apologize, because Naruto didn't catch her, so it never happened...!)

Sighing, she sat up. It was clear to her that she wouldn't be able to sleep anytime soon, so she decided she ought to do something productive.

Sakura opened her book from the library.

_Mithridatization: The Process of Exposing Oneself to Poisonous Substances._

She was reaching the end of her research, because if she finished that text tonight, she could begin to build immunity with Ino the next day.

Sakura fell asleep as she reached the last page, one notebook and piles of papers displaying evidence of her work on poisonous substances and genjutsu over the course of two days.

If nothing else, Sakura was a _great_ paper ninja.

♟

When Kizashi heard the first scream, he ran to his daughter's room.

All he wanted to do was wake his baby up from her nightmare. He understood her; he had only been about two years older than her when he had his first kill during his first C-rank (turned B-rank, its failure still haunting him in the form of a back injury), and he could relate to the nightmares.

But when he saw her, he just _knew_. Kizashi could see _it_ in her shaking form—

He could see _it_ in the way she struggled violently, and the way her hips wouldn't leave the bed as if there was an invisible weight on top of her, and the way her body was responding to the fathom touches that were anything but kind to her.

Fresh tears fell down her cheeks, and Kizashi had been a shinobi long enough to recognize that she was reliving some type of trauma.

"Please stop... please get off me!" she screamed, "You... you monster!"

It was the type of trauma that snatched away one's innocence—

He felt himself detach, watching the scene play out through a screen in his mindscape, hearing his baby girl's cries through his vessel, and all Kizashi could think was _my fault my fault my fault my fault—_

♟

_In her dreams, it was Koyo on top of her again._

_She should have been disoriented, but instead she knew exactly where she was and in whose company. She was also vaguely aware that this had happened before, but unlike before, she could feel everything Inner had helped her not notice by making her depersonalize._

_She felt humiliated_ —

 _Fearful_ —

 _Worthless_ —

 _Weak_ —

 _Violated_ —

 _Tainted_ —

 _Used_ —

— _And god, oh god, the pain was from another world_ —

 _"Please, stop," she whimpered, but this time her body wasn't on autopilot; this time it was her consciously controlling her movements, and she wished she could enter her mindscape with Inner, where she was_ safe _. "Please, get off me..."_

_A sadistic grin fell across Koyo's scarred face. "Cry for me, you slut," he ordered. "Cry for your miserable existence."_

_"Please...please, please stop!" she wailed. "Please stop!"_

_He dug the handle of the kunai in deeper, and she thrashed violently, arching her back. It was so, so vivid, and she could feel the rough forest beneath her back._

_"You...you monster!"_

_She screamed and screamed and screamed, yelling for Naruto, Sasuke-kun, Kakashi-sensei, Mama, Papa_ —

 _For anyone to save her_ —

Her eyes shot open, and she sat up, a final cry leaving her lips, one which she just couldn't prevent from escaping her mouth.

Pause.

She sunk her nails into her palm, just to make sure she was alive, but the pain wasn't enough confirmation.

Instead, she proceeded to place a hand on her heart and when she heard a steady beat, Sakura let out a sigh of relief when she realized that her dream was just that; a dream, not reality.

(And it couldn't be reality, because Tobi killed Koyo—she told herself this over and over and over again, but it just _wouldn't stick_ ).

Sakura looked around. The first thing she noticed was her face in the body-length mirror she used to check her appearance in every morning, and nearly gagged. To put it simply, her reflection showed turmoil and chaos, dried tears staining her cheeks and eyes swollen red from her emotional state.

She looked away.

Turning her gaze to the other side of her room, Sakura froze, because in the doorframe stood her father, and after a single glance at his face she knew _he knew about Wave_ —

His eyes; they were haunting, because they were glazed over, and she could recognize that familiar glint on herself as she depersonalized, opting to disassociate as a defense mechanism.

A whimper left her lips, and in a moment of hysteria she scrambled to her feet, snapped open her bedroom window and stood on the sill. Concentrating chakra to the soles of her feet, she crawled down the walls of her house and ran through the cold night without shoes on.

Papa didn't stop her.

Sakura soon found herself in a clearing of trees five minutes away from the civilian district. It was an instinctive location, because she used to spend a lot of time there before she became friends with Ino, and the second she reached it, she fell to her knees, releasing an ugly sob.

Sakura messed up. Badly.

Papa knew about her lies and cover-ups, and her world was crashing around her, because she wished he had gotten angry at her for not being strong enough to fight off the assaulters, but instead he had disassociated from the situation and she couldn't reach him because he was so far away (so far away, so far away, so _fucking_ far away—)

She was right regarding her initial assessment; the knowledge of her assault would debilitate him.

That's why Papa wasn't supposed to know!

But of course, she messed that simple task up in her sleep—literally, because she was that incompetent and useless.

Sakura wished she could enter her mindscape, just so the mania of emotions could stop (because all she needed was for it to _stop_ ). Instead of numbness, however, a pure, unquenchable rage bubbled in the pit of her stomach as she thought about how she was seemingly fated to constantly screw up.

Manically, Sakura stood to her feet, pulled back her fist and began to go through her katas. She needed to do something—anything—to release this crippling and self-destructive anger she felt rising up her throat like bile.

( _Useless, worthless, destined to be a fuck-up_ —a self-deprecating voice within her kept whispering attacks against her already low self-esteem, and it wasn't Inner.)

It could have been anywhere from a few minutes or a few hours, but Sakura couldn't tell as she lost track of the clock, instead timing her movements to the beat of her heart, which went a maddeningly fast _thump-thump-thump-thump_.

Eventually, she fell to the grass, watching the moon illuminate the sky, and only one thought echoed in her mind:

_What was the point of being a shinobi when Haruno Sakura was born to be a failure?_

♟

Kizashi was sitting in the dark at the foot of his bed, however, despite being there physically, he wasn't _really_ there.

Instead, he had closed himself off within his own mind and became a recluse.

Everything was clear to him—behind the awkward charisma, Haruno Kizashi was a failure. He was a failed father and a failed ninja who could never advance past the rank of genin despite how hard he tried for a promotion.

(The system of destiny was dead-set on him bending over backwards with effort, only to achieve nothing, because he was nothing—)

He wondered:

_What was the point of being a shinobi when Haruno Kizashi was born to be a failure?_

♟

**Konoha, April 8**

Morning came, and the sun lit up Konoha with its typical luminosity. Hinata felt peaceful; she was taking the long way to reach Team 8's training ground, enjoying the tranquility her loneliness provided her.

She ended up going through a familiar clearing near the civilian district. She kept her head low, because civilians weren't as... _comfortable_ with her eyes, and she didn't want to have any unnecessary confrontations.

Eventually, she passed through a clearing in the woods.

Hinata stopped moving when, from the corner of her vision, she saw a sleeping Haruno Sakura laying on the ground under the shade of a tree.

Her mind supplied her with all the information she could recall about Sakura-san: an old classmate from the Academy, brilliant in academics, and had an evident crush on Uchiha-san.

However, Sakura-san looked so... different, her pink hair in a buzz-cut and thin form covered in a white night gown—Hinata had to do a double-take, to make sure she hadn’t mistaken the identity for someone else.

 _Naruto-kun likes her_ , she realized, lips turning into a frown.

It wasn't a bitter thought, really; it was a sad one, because Hinata was so in love with Naruto-kun that his mere presence caused her heart to beat erratically and her face to flush red—

(A part of her whispered its quite envy for the pink-haired girl, but Hinata quickly brushed that part off.)

Hinata was confused and slightly worried. Why was Sakura-san asleep outside like _that_ , and had she been there all night? It couldn't have possibly been safe, especially alone.

With that thought in mind, Hinata pursed her lips. She reluctantly made her way to Sakura-san, bending down to her level to tap her on the shoulder timidly.

Hinata didn't know what she was expecting, but it certainly wasn't an attempted punch to the face.

♟

Although he never showed it, Mebuki and Sakura were the only lights in Kizashi's existence.

They kept him from going insane. Escort missions were depressing; being away from his family for so long was difficult on him mentally, but he did it, because he wanted to provide for his wife and daughter.

(He tried to ignore the fact that he wasn't particularly good at providing, because if he was, Mebuki wouldn't have had to work, and he wouldn't feel so damn _useless_ —)

He was the definition of an absent father. He failed to be there to watch his only child mature into a full-fledged shinobi, and he wasn't there for her emotionally, either.

Kizashi was an incompetent father—no, he wasn't even worthy of the title of father.

♟

Sakura felt a touch on her shoulder, and immediately, her body reacted by instinct, eyes snapping open and hands curling into a fist and mind telling her to _attack, attack, attack, attack—_

Her punch was blocked, fist grabbed expertly by another hand in an unwavering grip. Unable to free herself, Sakura cursed under her breath and went for the attacker's legs with a sweeping kick, but it was dodged.

She risked a glance at the person's face, and her eyes widened when she recognized the signature pupils of a certain classmate from her schooldays.

"Hinata!" Sakura gasped, before untangling herself from the girl. "I-I'm so sorry!" she sputtered. "I didn't know it was you..." she trailed off awkwardly, rubbing the back of her neck.

The girl gave a scrutinizing look (which was still impossibly polite), before nodding. "N-No, it's my f-fault," she stuttered, bowing her head slightly. "I shouldn't have s-scared you like that..."

Her voice was so quiet, Sakura had to strain to hear.

Releasing a sigh to calm the adrenaline rush she was still experiencing, Sakura looked over her former classmate.

Hinata appeared relatively the same, however Sakura knew she wasn't—although their altercation was only a few seconds long, it was evident that her abilities had gotten much better since their days in the Academy.

Sakura, on the other hand, had barely grown when it came to her skills, and a feeling of jealousy grazed her momentarily.

She shook her head before taking in her surroundings. Memories of yesterday came rushing back—she had fallen asleep outside after completing some katas, and she probably looked absolutely insane.

 _'Great. Absolutely fantastic,'_ Inner said, sarcasm dripping with an undertone of boiling anger. 

Then she remembered; she was supposed to meet Team 7 for training at 8:00! Panicking, she spoke. "Ah—I have to get dressed and go to training!" she cried over her shoulder. "Sorry again for attacking you, Hinata!" she apologized as she ran home, not noticing the perplexed expression the Hyuga donned.

She quickly henged into an unsuspecting teenage girl (because she'd be crazy to run through the civilian district in broad daylight looking like she was kidnapped from her bed).

As she passed through her neighborhood, she heard the unrestrained whispers and gossip; apparently Fukui Achikita, a middle-aged member of the genin corps, had officially been declared a rogue-nin. His son, Aikyo, who had started his first year at the Academy only a few months ago, was also missing.

A sudden attack of distress pricked Sakura like a thousand needles on her skin. She knew the man—Fukui-san worked part-time at a little bakery near her house, and he had made the cake for every birthday party she had since she was seven-years-old.

She had seen him only a few weeks ago, when she was celebrating her birthday early with her parents (and she had vaguely noticed his exhausted face, tired features making him look older than he really was).

How could Fukui-san do this? Anger filled her; she knew that times had been financially rough for genin, but it had been the same for a lot of people, including her father. Nonetheless, said people remained loyal to Konohagakure.

So how could he abandon the village?! And take his young and innocent son with him—

Sakura couldn't fathom it.

Her thoughts stopped racing once she reached her house, however, and she stood at the front door in contemplation.

Sakura was terrified. She didn't know what she was supposed to say to Papa, and she didn't want to know about how hurt he must have been—

The father-daughter relationship that had been so well-established between the duo, consisting of what Papa thought were witty puns and annoyed retorts from Sakura, was suddenly blurred.

She couldn't face him, and like the coward she was, she sent chakra to the soles of her feet and climbed up the house, entering through her room's window, which hadn't been shut since she exited in the early hours of the morning.

She glanced at the clock, and panic flew through her body. Sakura had to be at the training grounds in thirty minutes—!

Sakura jumped into the shower and was out within two minutes. It still caught her by surprise, how short her shower routine became without all the extra hair.

Drying herself with a towel, she threw on a T-shirt, training tights and her red hoodie, pulling up the hood to cover her head. She then slipped into her sandals, fastened her weapons pouch and _ran_.

(She refused to do any more torturous laps because Kakashi-sensei was a hypocrite!)

♟

Kizashi lost track of time, and before he knew it, the sun was shining through his bedroom window, signaling the initiation of daytime.

Knocking eventually rang through the house, its sound frantic just like his thoughts. Mechanically, Kizashi's body stood up and made its way to the front door, opening it up.

Tayori—the son of Kuroyagi-san, his landlord—stood on the other side. The boy, who looked to be about seven-years-old, sent a shy smile Kizashi's way, but the man couldn't register it.

"Good morning, Haruno-san. Sorry to bother you," Tayori apologized politely, "But my mother sent me here to pick up the rent."

Absentmindedly, Kizashi's vessel nodded and pulled out the money from his pocket, which was secured in an envelope.

The boy left soon after, but a sense of guilt attacked Kizashi, because he didn't earn most of the money; it was a combination of the wages earned by his wife and thirteen-year-old daughter.

He was supposed to provide, but instead he was drowning in debt. He was a complete and utter failure in every sense of the word.

Kizashi couldn't comprehend time, his movements or his words, but not even a constant state of depersonalization could keep the guilt and shame away.

It was his fault. If only he had more money, and if only he wasn't so bitter about being a career-genin, and if only he didn't send Sakura to the Academy to complete the shinobi dream he never could—

If he was content with his daughter being a civilian, his family wouldn't be struggling with debt, and Sakura would have constant access to her mother, and she wouldn't have been violated during a mission she wasn't prepared for—

All he could think was _my fault my fault my fault_ —

There was only one way out; there was only one way he could deal with his guilt, and it was to cease existing.

He had to _cease existing_ —

He had to _die_ —

That was the _only way out._

♟

Kakashi sat in a tree and casually spied on his students from behind his book.

Sakura barely made it on time, frantically racing to the red bridge they often met at to avoid being late, only to be confronted by a bickering Sasuke and Naruto.

She greeted them with poorly-disguised exasperation, which Naruto didn't notice, but Sasuke did based on the subtle glance he gave from his peripheral vision.

Kakashi hadn't even particularly noted it until yesterday, but the relationship between Sasuke and Sakura shifted from supportive to strained within a matter of moments. In Wave, the duo was showing a budding sense of mutual respect; however, although Sakura's admiration for him was only growing, after Sasuke witnessed the girl greeting her parents, he became crueler.

Evidentially, parental jealousy changed his perspective on their bond.

And then there was Sasuke and Naruto—he was worried for them the most, because their relationship was even more bipolar. There were times where they showed a brotherly bond built from a difficult upbringing and had camaraderie, but then there were other times where they looked like they could kill each other.

Finally, there was Sakura and Naruto. It was clear to Kakashi that the former's annoyance at the blond was reaching a boiling point, whereas Naruto's advances on Sakura were becoming less and less frequent. However, the great copy-ninja Hatake Kakashi didn't know what any of that truly meant for the future of Team 7, and that fact unsettled him.

Kakashi continued to read Icha Icha from his place in the tree, before finally deciding to grace his cute little genin with his presence; he was only an hour "late", which truly was a springtime miracle.

After the initial angry greetings from Naruto and Sakura, he had the boys start on their individual stretches and beckoned the female member of Team 7 for her individual training session.

Kakashi didn't bother with explaining the basics of genjutsu since it was clear to him that she knew them already. Instead, he started with the practical right away.

"I'm going to cast D-ranked illusions on you," he explained simply, "and you're going to break them."

Nodding with determination, she sat down on the ground, leg crossed over the other and senses clearly straining to be more perceptive.

Kakashi began with a simple genjutsu, opting to cast the Hell-Viewing Technique.

It took her a moment to identify the genjutsu, and seconds after leaves began to swarm her surroundings, Sakura murmured a "kai," forming the guiding hand sign while simultaneously disrupting her chakra flow.

Kakashi didn't give her a moment to recover, casting five more D-ranks in quick succession. She found them with ease (which wasn't really surprising considering how the illusions were easily detectable due their beginners classification).

Sakura was clearly unnerved by some of the images, and occasionally took longer to dispel them, taking time to wholly digest the illusions before disrupting her chakra flow. During one of these prolonged pauses, he hurled a kunai at her, aiming the knife inches above her head.

"You can't afford to be distracted," he chastised firmly. "In a real battle, it would only take one hit, and you're done."

She gulped, still taken aback by the sudden attack, before nodding. She placed her hand in the ram sign—Kakashi was content to note that she was using ram and tiger interchangeably—before breaking the next illusion he cast.

Eventually, after about forty minutes, Kakashi stopped the genjutsu training.

His lips turned upwards, and he reached out to ruffle her hair. "You did well, Sakura," he complimented, and she positively _shone_.

Grinning, she awaited his next instructions.

"Now," he started. "I want you to find a quiet place and start to meditate. I'm assuming you know how meditation increases chakra supply."

Sakura nodded. "Spiritual energy, the chakra derived from mental strength, is found in the mind and spirit. It can be used to increase chakra reserves through studying, experience and meditation," she recited. "Meditation is one of the most direct methods of increasing chakra supplies—a civilian who has spent a lot of time meditating can have the same chakra levels as fully-developed ninjas."

Kakashi nodded. "Good," he said. "Now get going," he told her, before turning around to beckon Sasuke to start training him with his Sharingan.

♟

In his note, Kizashi was trying so hard to justify the decision he was about to make.

He tried to be honest, because some part of him recognized that his family deserved at least that much, and after leaving instructions for the aftermath of his death, he discussed his emotional state openly.

On a separate piece of paper, he wrote about how stressed out he was financially; how lonely missions got and how disconnected he felt from people; how he felt inferior to his comrades because of his career-genin label; how he failed his wife as he was unable to make enough money; how he was an absent parent, thus ashamed; how guilt-ridden he was because his insecurities was what caused his daughter's _rape_ —

—and then he burned the note regarding his reasons, because it was pointless to try to find the logic in something as illogical as choosing death over life.

But in the moment, despite what his inner-reasoning told him, suicide seemed like the only option.

♟

Training one-on-one with Kakashi-sensei was the most productive thing she had done in years.

Despite only having one hour with him, she remained completely focused, only glancing at Sasuke-kun twice and ignoring Naruto's advances completely, despite how tempting it was to outright reject him.

(Her earlier harsh rejection by Sasuke-kun gave her a hint of sympathy for Naruto, but she'd never admit _that_!)

She knew Kakashi-sensei was scary, but good god those illusions were borderline traumatic—he apparently wasn't called Kakashi of 1000 jutsu for no reason.

Meditating, on the other hand, was tedious, but Sakura did it nonetheless; she was under no delusions about her genetics and knew well enough that she had slightly below-average chakra supply for her age, and although she could compensate with her better control to a certain extent, it wasn't enough.

After all their individual training sessions ended, Team 7 went to the mission desk to pick up three D-ranks, which were just as much of an annoyance as usual. Once completed, Sakura was covered in multiple cat scratches, and if looks could kill, Tora would be dead.

On top of that, Sasuke-kun still hadn't spoken to her.

With a mix of anger and sadness, Sakura murmured a quick goodbye to her team before making her way to the library.

(She couldn't go back home, because she still hadn't thought of a game plan to confront her father, and she had never been good at improvisation.)

On the way there, however, she passed by Training Ground 3, and recognized a familiar blonde ponytail. She perked up immediately, breaking into a jog towards her frenemy. "Ino!" she exclaimed, waving her arm in an exaggerated greeting.

The blonde, who was sitting against one of the stumps, snapped her neck in Sakura's direction, eyes igniting in recognition. "Forehead," she greeted with fake disdain. Her skin was gleaming with light perspiration as she watched Shikamaru and Chōji spar in hand-to-hand combat nearby.

Sakura grinned. "I had to talk to you," she began vaguely, "because I think we're ready to start gaining immunity!"

Before Ino could open her mouth, she was interrupted by of a voice coming from behind Sakura. "Hello there," the voice—an adult male, she registered—greeted.

Sakura flinched comically, turning around in shock and getting into battle position, throwing a punch in the direction of the attacker—

Like earlier in the day, her ambush was dodged (which was a large blow to her already low confidence), but she calmed down once she recognized that the man was wearing a Konoha hitai-ate.

Ino stood up angrily. "Don't scare her like that, Sensei!" she squealed, pointing an accusing finger at the man protectively.

The man—Asuma, Ino's sensei—sweat-dropped. Sakura's eyes widened in recognition (because this jounin was somehow related to the _Hokage_!), before bowing hastily. "I'm so sorry, Sarutobi-san!" she exclaimed. "And I'm also sorry for interrupting your training!"

"Ah, call me Asuma-sensei," he said, ignoring her apology. "You must be Sakura, Kakashi's student," he smiled knowingly. "Ino's told us a lot about you."

Sakura glanced at Ino in surprise, but the blonde was looking away stubbornly, a light blush staining her cheeks out of embarrassment. Despite being taken aback, the pink-haired girl nodded politely at the man. "Yes, and Ino's mentioned great things about you and your team," she lied, because all Ino talked about was how absolutely irritating her squad was (although Sakura knew that her annoyance was fake).

Asuma-sensei snorted in disbelief, clearly catching on to the lie as he lit up a cigarette. He appeared to be a very laid-back person, and he seemed fairly approachable. He smiled teasingly at Ino. "So, what's this 'immunity' thing about, huh?" he pried.

Ino scrunched her nose up in faux annoyance. "Well, if you must know, Sakura and I are building immunity to poisons together," she huffed in a matter-of-factly tone.

Sakura saw Shikarmaru glance curiously at them, dodging a soft kick Chōji sent his way; apparently Chōji was still gentle and didn't particularly enjoy fighting—it was such a different dynamic to her own teammates, she realized.

Asuma-sensei looked at the duo with a moment of surprise shining in his eyes, before nodding thoughtfully.

"Are you kids being safe?" he asked.

Sakura nodded. "Combined with Ino's expertise on plant-life and my extensive research on mithridatization, we now know which plants and metal-based substances, are... _relatively_ safe in small doses."

"Also, I'll ask my mother to supervise us," Ino added.

Asuma-sensei seemed a bit lost momentarily in the scientific jargon, taking a second to catch up with their words, before chuckling. "Alright," he responded, amused.

He then glanced at Chōji and Shikamaru, who had stopped their spar and were laying on the ground.

"Hey," he called in annoyance, face twitching. "Resume your spar!" he demanded, then murmured something under his breath about lazy-cloud-watching-Naras and their bad influence on overly-gentle-Akimichis.

Ino snickered as Shikamaru groaned. It was a strange environment to Sakura; Team 10 was so laid-back, whereas Team 7 was always slightly strained, a fact that Sakura hadn't even realized until she saw Ino's squad interacting with one another.

"Hey, Forehead, take off the hood," Ino commanded abruptly, placing her hands on her hips in a scolding manner. "Did you already forget what I taught you about confidence? The more you hide something, the more people will make fun of you!"

Sakura's eye twitched comically, before she shook her head in defiance. "Hell no," she gritted out.

A vein bulged on Ino's forehead, before she stood up, reaching to slap the hood off her head. However, Sakura prevented her from following through with an instinctual rising block. The blonde snarled. "Why you..." she began, before going in for another attack, which Sakura dodged.

Before she knew it, the duo was engaging in hand-to-hand combat. Surprisingly, Sakura was holding her own fairly well against the top kunoichi of her graduating class for about five minutes, which was an accomplishment in her eyes.

However, apparently, she got overconfident, and soon Ino decided to get serious—Sakura found herself in a headlock, and her opponent was pulling her hood off her head.

The pink-haired girl gritted her teeth as the breeze grazed the exposed nape of her neck—it was evident that Ino's taijutsu was still better than that of Sakura, which was a huge blow to her ego, considering Yamanakas weren't primarily combat fighters.

She, on the other hand, was on Team 7, a _combat_ squad.

"I win," Ino whispered in her ear, causing a slight shiver to travel up the pink-haired girl's spine.

Sighing dejectedly, Sakura pushed herself away from the blonde. She frowned, before her eyes glazed with determination. "You may have won this one," she started, "but I won’t lose to you in the long-term, Pig!"

There was a moment of silence, before Ino smirked. "I won't lose to you either, Billboard Brow."

That was all the confirmation Sakura needed before she charged at the blonde again and again and _again_.

♟

Kizashi was numb as he secured the belt around his neck, carefully keeping his balance on the stool he stood on.

A part of him—a barely-there voice within—couldn't believe what was happening; he had spent his entire life as a shinobi fighting to remain alive, but ironically, now he was fighting to die.

The letter he wrote was placed on the kitchen counter alongside his cherry blossom pendant, which was a piece of jewelry he had worn everywhere for fifteen years. Both items were secured in an envelope.

As per always, his back was hurting, but he was so far gone he could barely notice it. Tears fell down his face, but he remained in a state of disassociation.

He was trapped in his own mind and all he could feel was guilt and shame—

Kizashi was ready. He took a moment to make sure he didn't forget anything.

(Did he lock the door, so Sakura wouldn't be the one to find his body? Yes. Did he make dinner? Yes. Did he make all the necessary changes to his will? Yes. Did he water the plants? Yes.)

Taking one last breath of air, Kizashi grit his teeth and took the step off the chair—

—And regret pooled him immediately because his neck didn't snap the way he calculated. Instead, he couldn't breathe because he was suffocating, and his airways were blocked, and the pressure mounted, and he could feel the veins in his face burst and his heart began to ache and _good_ _god he was suffocating_ —

He struggled like a madman, gasping for air and grasping his neck because it was so _painful_ —

And then it just ended, and the betrayed eyes of his only daughter was the last image his oxygen-deprived brain could produce.

Haruno Kizashi died on April 8th by suicide, hanging on his ceiling fan.

His body wouldn't be discovered until six days later.

♟

Sakura felt uncontrollable shivers run up her spine, and as she walked back home under the moon, she got this sudden premonition.

She shook the thought off; she was just being paranoid. Instead, she watched the moon, and made a silent, childish wish to one day visit it.

It was 10:00 PM, and she just came back from the library, where she had studied until her eyes ached. Before that, she had sparred with Ino for a few hours, and although she gave the blonde a run for her money, she still lost every time.

Still, she was determined to become the victor soon, and it was because of this Asuma-sensei told her to come to their training ground more often—apparently their rivalry was a good motivator for Ino, too.

As she got home, she debated going inside from her window, but decided against it; it was time to talk to Papa.

The truth was she wasn't ready, and she didn't know what she was going to say to him, but she decided she couldn't keep pushing it away, so with shaking hands she entered through the front door and went to his bedroom.

_Knock, knock, knock._

No response. Sakura waited a few more seconds before she called for her father. "Papa?" she questioned, before grasping the door handle to attempt to enter his room.

It was locked.

Frowning, Sakura made her way to the kitchen, expecting to find him there. Instead, she was met by an envelope on the kitchen counter.

Annoyance filled her. She knew what a letter meant; her father went away on another mission, and he was probably already halfway through Fire country already.

With a mix of irritation and relief, Sakura didn't even bother to open the envelope before she searched for food—she found bento packed in a box, and hungrily, she devoured it.

Smiling with satisfaction, Sakura went upstairs to prepare to go to bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ So... yeah, I hope I made it clear the reasons behind Kizashi's decision, but in a nutshell, it was guilt, loneliness and a sense of worthlessness, which caused a depressive state amplified by how detached he was.  
> ✿I know that a lot has happened in a short time, but the next chapter will explore Sakura's growth in a week.  
> ✿ Thank you for all the reviews - I love interacting with you all :) Anyhow, does anyone want to beta this?


	8. Six Days

oblivious little girl learns that ignorance is bliss—she halts, thinking good god this is all her fault.

♟

**Konoha, April 9**

Sakura had fallen into a set routine when it came to Team 7 within a day.

After she would wake up and eat breakfast, she would complete her daily stretches at home. That way, she would have more time to work on stamina and conditioning at the training grounds, something she decided to do during the time Kakashi-sensei was late.

(Really, she was a genius for managing her time like that! She resolved that she wouldn’t let Sensei’s laziness drag her down from her goal of becoming a kunoichi strong enough to defend herself.)

On the other hand, the pink-haired girl despised stamina training with a burning passion. It was embarrassing, really, how quickly she would collapse after a few laps around their designated training ground, which would earn her an unimpressed glance from Sasuke-kun.

But Sakura got back up every time, because she would show Sasuke-kun that she was at least _trying_.

(Naruto didn’t even realize that she had been completing laps, because that idiot had fallen asleep by the time he stopped bickering with Sasuke-kun! God, he was so... so.... _annoying_!)

She was the first student to be beckoned to train one-on-one with Kakashi-sensei out of her teammates. She was still learning about breaking out of genjutsu, and Kakashi-sensei had to know _at least_ 100 different D-ranked illusions, because Sakura had yet to break any that he had already previously cast on her.

Sakura, on the other hand, knew one D-rank genjutsu that was classified as supplementary. She had a long way to go before she could even call her skills in illusions _competent_ , let alone _advanced_.

After breaking out of borderline traumatic image after image, Sakura always felt mentally exhausted. She discovered that mental exhaustion could be as painful as physical exhaustion, but theoretically, all her studying in the library and practice with genjutsu should work towards increasing her spiritual chakra.

“Theoretically” being the keyword.

Although her training sessions with Kakashi-sensei were supposed to last an hour, he would typically dismiss her within thirty minutes, opting to give the extra time to Naruto. Sakura didn’t particularly mind—Naruto needed the extra time, because he was hopeless when it came to understanding basic shinobi theory and chakra control, and would therefore be a liability in real missions since he didn't have a firm base.

Nonetheless, she didn’t understand why he only took time from her training session, and none from Sasuke-kun’s; realistically, he could decrease both their training by fifteen minutes to be equal until Naruto reached an adequate level.

 _‘Or, he could actually show up on time and train us! That way, time constraints wouldn’t be a problem, CHA!’_ Inner roared, causing Sakura to cringe at the sudden intrusion.

For the rest of the session, Sakura would meditate. It was mind-numbing, and as a result she found herself actually _looking forward_ to the tedious D-rank missions, just so she could have something to actively do.

For Sakura, things were moving slowly, but at least they were _moving_.

♟

**Konoha, April 10**

When Sakura got to their meeting spot at the bridge the following day, she was met by a present Kakashi-sensei and no teammates.

The white-haired man raised a hand in greeting, head buried behind his book. “Yo,” he said.

Sakura arched a thin brow, because Sasuke-kun was always early and Sensei was always late; therefore, something was off, since both of these consistent rules regarding her team’s dynamic were broken.

As if reading her mind, he smiled, eye crinkling. “I’ve dismissed the boys. Training’s been canceled for today,” he explained. “I have to go on a mission in the village outskirts. We’ll meet again tomorrow.”

Sakura nodded in understanding. She knew that although Kakashi-sensei was their instructor, he was also a revered shinobi, and had other obligations to Konoha. Before she could even open her mouth to bid him farewell, however, he disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Her left eye twitched. He didn’t even say goodbye! She could feel Inner at the edge of suffering from a brain aneurysm due to the sheer awkwardness that was her teacher.

Groaning, she was about to turn around and go back home, but suddenly, she froze in her spot; maybe Ino-pig would be up for some sparring? After all, Asuma-sensei had previously encouraged her to seek out the blonde...?

Building her resolve, Sakura made her way to Training Ground 3—it was a longshot, but hopefully, Ino and her team would be there.

Out of dumb-luck, Sakura spotted the trio at the same training ground as a few days ago, and her mouth dropped as she witnessed Team 10 going against Asuma-sensei in a spar.

The genin were actually _winning_ against the jounin.

Chōji’s arms were larger than most buildings, stretching long enough to reach Asuma-sensei from a distance and hands big enough to wrap around his frame, effectively immobilizing the jounin; shadows were escaping from Shikamaru’s feet and meeting that of his target’s; Ino was standing next to Shikamaru, creating a hand seal she had never studied before, but based on what Ino told her in the past, she could assume that it was a clan technique.

They were so in tune with each other, coherency displayed in how they moved in sync—it was evident that their teamwork was leagues ahead of that of Team 7.

“It’s a variation of Ino-Shika-Chō formation, Forehead,” Ino explained coolly, and Sakura blushed beet red at being caught spying. “It’s a cooperation ninjutsu, specialized for capture and interrogation.”

Asuma-sensei smiled as Chōji released him. “It’s one of the most formidable techniques out there,” he said, clearly proud of his student’s accomplishment.

Shikamaru sighed. The shadows that were escaping him began to recede, signaling an end to the technique. “It’s more troublesome than formidable,” he grumbled, yawning lazily.

Ino rolled her eyes. Then, she turned to look at Sakura. “Here to spar?” she questioned, and Sakura wondered if she was secretly using her clan technique, because the blonde easily read her thoughts.

The pink-haired girl nodded. “Only if you’re up to it, Pig,” she said, smirking.

♟

Ino made the Seal of Confrontation, and Sakura reciprocated the action, eyes fierce as they initiated their spar.

Sakura attacked first, coming at her with a punch, and Ino blocked it, performing a back-flip and simultaneously sending a kick aimed at her jaw.

_Crack._

Eyes widening, she realized that her hit actually _landed_ , something she didn’t expect to occur, and a painful snap was heard.

Silence filled the air as panic began to fill Ino. What was she thinking? Sakura wasn’t strong enough to face her—

“Fuck,” Sakura cursed, clutching her jaw.

Ino began to say something, because she had never heard her friend cuss (it was so... so... so _un-Sakura-like_ ), but she closed her mouth abruptly because she was suddenly being attacked again. Ino instinctually dropped to the ground to dodge the kick.

“Take me seriously, Pig—dammit!”

Sakura’s kick hit a tree behind her, and a crack formed in the trunk. Ino’s eyes widened; she herself didn’t have the strength to use such force in her hits.

Ino glanced at her rival from behind her bangs, and in that moment, she realized that Sakura was blooming, and one day, she’d be absolutely _stunning_.

♟

Obito stood under the cover of trees and watched the pink-haired girl fight.

She looked different from the last time he saw her; gone was her long hair, which she attempted to cover with the red hood she wore, and gone was the dead look in her eyes.

Her taijutsu wasn’t particularly great, he noted. The Academy must have gotten soft due to peace-time, because when he was a genin, such an inadequate level would never have been acceptable.

Nonetheless, there was potential. The girl was enhancing her hits with chakra, if only a little. Furthermore, she was going against the daughter of the Yamanaka clan-head, and although the latter hadn’t unleashed her full strength, Sakura was pushing her closer to doing so.

Since she left his cabin in Wave, Obito had been monitoring Sakura through the use of White Zetsu, who had been given the instruction to kill her if she were to even show signs of uttering “Tobi-sensei” or what really happened on March 22nd.

However, Zetsu had informed Guruguru (who thus informed Obito) of some new developments; the girl’s father had apparently taken his life in the bedroom next to hers, and Sakura didn’t even know it.

(He didn’t think about how this made her more like Kakashi and less like Rin, because he _wouldn’t go_ _there_ , and instead he’d make sure that Sakura was together with her father in the new world, where everyone would be a victor and there would be no losers.)

Obito, after using Kamui to get to Konoha to observe her for himself, made the decision not to interfere; being the one to give her the bad news would only make her associate him with pain, he decided, which simply wouldn’t do.

Instead, Obito would be there to pick up the pieces once she broke, just like he was there in Wave, and just like he would continue to be when the life of the shinobi would cause her more avoidable pain—

—emotional dependency was the key to controlling children scarred by the traumas of the unjust world, after all, and the more emotionally dependent the child was, the easier it was to turn them into pawns.

♟

Sakura was completely out of breath, chest heaving and lungs burning as she panted for air. However, it appeared that Ino was on the same boat, which satisfied her immensely.

The duo had been at it for thirty minutes using only taijutsu, and although Sakura had gotten a few hits in, she was far more bruised than the blonde in front of her.

Sakura was anything but dumb. It was clear that Ino didn’t use her full strength, which annoyed her to no end. All Sakura wanted was to be acknowledged by Ino, and she resolved that, soon, she would be.

“I think that’s enough, girls,” Asuma-sensei chimed in from the sidelines, and Ino nodded.

Sakura didn’t want it to end, but she initiated the Seal of Reconciliation anyways. Ino locked her fingers with Sakura’s, a closed-eye smile reaching her face.

Suddenly, the pink-haired girl remembered something. She pulled out the scroll Tenten-chan gave her from her pouch and summoned a list she had written out the day before.

“Pig,” she addressed her kind-of-friend. “I created a list for all the substances we need and a six-month plan to building immunity,” she explained, grinning in accomplishment.

Ino grabbed the multiple pieces of paper from her head and scanned it. She met Sakura’s eyes. “Alright!” she proclaimed after a moment, grinning. “Let’s go to the flower shop—we can pick up some of the ingredients, and Okaa-san can heal us up, too!”

♟

Some days were better than others, and in the middle of the night, Sakura woke up in her bed crying and screaming and shaking because she dreamt of that _monster_ Koyo—

She lurched over the side of her bed, vomit escaping her mouth, the taste of bile bitter to her tongue. Once she was able to gain control over her body, she felt completely and utterly hysterical.

Her cries wracked her being, and she wailed with more violence than she ever had before. Sakura didn’t sob quietly; her breakdown was large, every particle in her small frame exploding into immense storms of excessive emotions.

Sakura felt like she was hanging by a thread.

Racing to her toilet, Sakura jumped into the shower and began to scrub at her body manically, because _she had to clean herself of the monster, she had to clean herself of the monster, she had to—_

Numbly, she realized that her skin was turning red because of the harsh scrubbing.

_—clean herself of the monster, she had to clean herself of the monster, she had to clean herself of the monster, she—_

Angry, inflamed skin was broken into by her nails, blood beginning to ooze out of the now-open scar on her inner thigh, but she could barely register the pain.

_—had to clean herself of the monster, she had to clean herself of the monster, she had to—_

_'Stop,'_ Inner commanded firmly, but the voice was nearly drowned out by Sakura's overpowering, racing thoughts.

Suddenly, she felt her consciousness being pulled out of her body by Inner and placed into her mindscape, entering a state of depersonalization she had managed to avoid for the past four days.

She glanced at the point of view shot from the screen in front of her, and witnessed her vessel calmly getting out of the shower.

Her consciousness was sitting next to Inner. Sakura could feel the bone-chilling aura the entity emitted—it was a wave of pure, unadulterated rage, and it terrified her.

Her eyes widened. Was _that_ really a part of her? Was Sakura really prone to such anger?

 _'You should listen to me,'_ Inner said, head tilted to the side.

She was quiet; too quiet. Inner was meant to be loud, so this uncharacteristic lack of volume was _not normal, not normal, not normal—_

 _'I am you,'_ Inner told Sakura, _'therefore everything I do, I do it to protect you, so don’t fight me.'_

♟

**Konoha, April 11**

On a regular basis, Kakashi found himself exhausted by the time training finished and Team 7 left to pick up their daily missions.

He had to cast genjutsu after genjutsu on Sakura, as well as activate his Sharingan for long periods of time in order to demonstrate to Sasuke how to use it efficiently. It was exhausting on his chakra supply; although he was a shinobi feared across the world as the "great Copy Ninja", he was only given average reserves at birth.

Teaching Naruto was another kind of difficult. The boy hated chakra control exercises and shinobi theory because it was, quote on quote, "boring and so uncool, dattebayo!"

Kakashi was forced to go over lessons with him that he should have learned in his first year at the Academy, but luckily, Naruto was catching on fast.

Kakashi had no doubt in his mind that, had the boy been given the proper resources in school, he would have been a genius like Minato-sensei. However, instead he had been neglected by all the staff because of the Kyuubi sealed inside him, and Iruka could only do so much to help the boy on his own. 

Nonetheless, his chakra control was deplorable, like Kushina-neechan.

Because of his large reserves, he unknowingly used too much chakra, and although he could pull off techniques like the Shadow Clone jutsu with ease, he failed basic ones such as the regular clone technique. 

Sasuke and Sakura were also advancing at rapid rates. Although the former's progress wasn't such a surprise considering his heritage, Sakura was showing a determination he had never seen her don.

He put two and two together; this new-found motivation was the result of the altercation she had with the Iwa-nin in Wave, and Kakashi was thus conflicted about his feelings on the matter.

On one hand, Kakashi felt guilty because she was his responsibility and a literal _child_ —

However, Zabuza had proven how her subpar skill-level when it came to combat could make her a liability, so perhaps a wake-up call was necessary...?

He chewed his lip; maybe things had to occur like this, he mused morbidly, because a loss of innocence was better than the loss of his students' young lives on a mission gone wrong because they unprepared.

With that thought in mind, he beckoned Sakura over to begin her private training for the day.

♟

“Sakura,” Kakashi-sensei began. “Tell me: what factors determine the strength of a genjutsu?” he questioned.

“The chakra control needed to cast it,” she answered with ease.

Sensei nodded, but continued to quiz her, asking, “And how is chakra controlled to create higher-level illusions?”

She thought for a second. “Typically,” she began, “more chakra control is required when creating vivid images, and thus there are more hand signs needed to guide the input to its destination...?”

“Correct,” he smiled, and she shone at the approval. “But,” Sensei added, voice grave, “there are some people in this world who can create illusions so powerful they’re nearly unbreakable, and not even use a single hand sign.”

Sakura froze, connecting the dots. “You mean people with the Sharingan, especially the genjutsu type,” she deducted.

“Yes.”

Pause.

“Maa,” Kakashi-sensei dismissed. “Don’t worry about that too much. Instead, tell me how one should deal with a very strong genjutsu.”

She tried to recall her reading. “Theoretically, if disrupting their chakra isn’t enough, one should try to reverse their chakra flow,” she recited. “But, if that isn’t enough either, I would try to break it through stimulating pain.”

He nodded. “And do you know how to reverse your chakra flow?” he asked

Sakura shook her head.

“I want you to try.”

She saw this coming from a mile away, so she patiently waited for him to teach her how to reverse her chakra flow—only, said explanation never came, and she had to stop herself from lashing out when Kakashi-sensei gave no indication of doing so.

He clearly expected her to do this on her own, so she made the tiger hand sign, scanning her body for her chakra. She played around with it for a bit, before biting her lip in concentration.

She simply went for it, pulling the chakra from the tips of her fingers back into her stomach.

The result was absolutely dizzying, and she stumbled on her own feet, falling to the ground.

Sakura quickly released her chakra, allowing for it to travel naturally again.

“Good job,” Sensei told her. She didn’t even realize that he was scanning her with his Sharingan, and could thus see her chakra flow.

The pink-haired girl grinned.

Once training was over and Team 7 completed their missions, Sakura went home after sending a single, extremely depressed glance in the direction of Sasuke-kun; she looked oddly similar to a kicked puppy.

On the way to her house, she stopped by the library to return the books she had previously checked out.

The jounin that manned the library desk, Hayate, she learned, nodded at her after recovering from a coughing fit, and she bowed her head slightly in greeting. She placed the books on the return desk and walked back home.

She passed by one of the Academy students that followed Naruto around (Moegi, she recognized), who waved at her, which she returned warily.

That night, as Sakura passed her parents’ room to get to her own, a scent attacked her nostrils. She scrunched up her nose and gagged; it smelled like rotting meat seeping through the opening of the door, but at the same time, the scent was sweet and sour and absolutely _disgusting_.

Sakura tried opening the door, but it didn’t budge, and she recalled that it had been locked.

(She subconsciously realized that it was strange; her parents never locked their bedroom, so why was it now?)

Because of this, for the next thirty minutes she tried to pick the lock, just like Mizuki-sensei taught them in the Academy. But her efforts were to no avail, it seemed, and with a sigh of frustration Sakura threw her supplies to the ground.

Maybe the smell was occurring because something was wrong with plumbing? She could ask Kuroyagi-san to call a locksmith and a plumber—

Then Sakura realized that she didn’t have the money to pay for these services at that moment. Sighing, she decided that it would be best to simply wait for her mother to deal with the issue, and thus Sakura grabbed an air-freshener and sprayed it in the offending vicinity, hoping the problem would just go away on its own.

Sakura went to shower and proceeded to fall asleep.

(She would later regret her actions, just as Kizashi regretted his death from the Pure Lands.)

♟

**Konoha, April 12**

Kakashi watched as Team 7 once again attempted to catch Tora, the cat that had been dead-set on torturing his cute-little-genin to no end since the squad had been initiated.

They were failing their mission miserably, and he knew the root of the problem, which was disguised as an innocent pink-haired girl (even though she didn’t know it).

He recalled the conversation he had with the Professor on the day of the Bell Test.

_“I carefully consider each of these assignments with more depth than what the Academy teachers realize,” said Hokage-sama, taking a sip of his drink._

_Kakashi knew why Iruka thought Team 7 was assembled; Sasuke, the Rookie of the Year and Naruto, the worst student in his class, were placed on the same squad to balance them out. Sakura was placed there so she could improve her combat skills, which wasn’t her strength._

_Sandaime-sama proceeded to talk about how important it was to have teams with well-thought composition and specific specialization, and Kakashi immediately caught on—_

_There was more regarding the reasoning behind Hiruzen-sama’s decision. One already clear example of said reasoning was that the new Team 7 was made to mimic the dynamic between Kakashi, Obito and Rin so Kakashi would be emotionally invested in their development._

_“Naruto is the Jinchūriki of the Kyuubi and Sasuke has the potential to activate the Sharingan,” stated Kakashi in realization. It made sense, since having an Uchiha paired with the Jinchūriki meant Sasuke's Sharingan could control the Kyuubi, avoiding another devastating attack by the Nine-Tails._

_“As I mentioned earlier,” Hokage-sama began, “you are the only one who can advise Sasuke about his Sharingan.”_

_Ah. That made sense._

_Pause._

_“I understand that those two are special, but what about the girl, Sakura?”_

_Hiruzen-sama looked up. “Well, I believe she has the potential to be a good kunoichi. Right now, she’s average, however...”_

_There was silence as the Hokage looked up nostalgically._

_“Talent attracts women,” Sandaime-sama said vaguely, but Kakashi understood immediately what he meant. “Men notice women who notice other men, and rivalry matures both,” he explained._

_So that was Sakura’s position on the squad: she was to boost Sasuke’s ego, which would motivate Naruto to try harder, and the rivalry between the boys would encourage both destined-to-be powerful shinobi to grow immensely. “You’ve already thought about how the team will develop,” Kakashi remarked, amazed._

_That was the underneath the underneath, he realized—Sakura would be to Naruto what Rin had been to Obito; a motivation to get stronger in order to win the girl they liked by defeating their prodigious rival, which were Sasuke and Kakashi respectively._

Kakashi snapped out of his musings.

Team 7 had been failing their mission because of the tension between Sasuke and Sakura, Kakashi figured out, because since Sakura wasn’t encouraging Sasuke, the rivalry between Naruto and the last Uchiha wasn’t being instigated, meaning neither of the boys were truly trying.

That just wouldn’t do, Kakashi decided, thinking of a course of action to fix this.

♟

The itching across her body was unbearable.

Sakura constantly felt like she was at the edge of crying, because she hadn't considered how utterly painful building immunity to different substances would be, despite what Yamanaka-san told her.

She didn't even want to think of the fact that poison ivy would be the least painful of the substances she and Ino would take in over the course of six months.

They were catching that stupid cat, Tora. If Kakashi-sensei wasn’t watching, Sakura would have just stood in her spot, but instead, she was checking behind some bushes. However, any onlookers would easily see that she wasn’t really trying, her attempts half-hearted at best.

She spared Sasuke-kun, who was setting up a trap nearby, a sad glance—he hadn't spoken to her in five days, keeping communication strictly non-verbal, and that just shattered her love-stricken heart.

Sakura had hoped that he would see how hard she was working to get stronger, but he didn't notice her.

She sighed, before she saw something from her peripheral vision. Her mouth twitched into a sneer.

It was that stupid Tora.

She was tempted to turn around and pretend she never saw it, because god help her she despised that cat, and she didn’t need any more alarming scratches on her skin.

But then Inner spoke.

 _‘Just catch it quickly!’_ exclaimed the voice in her head, more annoyed than encouraging. _‘The faster we complete the mission, the sooner we can go and spar with Ino-pig!’_

That statement caused Sakura to freeze up, and suddenly, she felt a surge of motivation since Ino was mentioned.

She looked at Tora, assessing the cat’s position. It was sitting on a tree branch, seemingly asleep, but she knew better than to underestimate Tora; the cat had better stealth, balance and speed than most genin her age.

Sakura began to think of a strategy. Her genjutsu would be useless, she decided, since she only knew the Hell-Viewing Technique, which would only scare the animal away.

Then it hit her: she should cut off the whiskers.

Although the action wouldn’t necessarily cause Tora to lose her balance, it should disorient her long enough to be grabbed, and it wouldn’t be painful either (although it was a bit cruel, but at this point, Sakura couldn’t care less).

Sakura grabbed a kunai in her hand, performed the transformation technique and turned herself into a minuscule bug so she wouldn't be noticed.

Then, she jumped at the cat.

(Okay, so she might have stolen the premise for this technique from Naruto, but who cares, really!)

In midair, Sakura broke her henge and threw her kunai at Tora, slicing off half of her whiskers on her right side within a millisecond. The cat mewled in horror, trying to run away, but tripped on its own feet due to disorientation.

“Shannaro!” Sakura cried, before she jumped off the ground again and proceeding to tackle the oversized cat to the floor.

‘ _SUCESS!_ ’ Inner squealed, and Sakura held the stupid feline as far away from her face as possible, but that didn’t stop the scratches from appearing on her arms.

Naruto fell casually from a tree nearby, before he came running at her. “That was so cool, Sakura-chan!” he exclaimed.

He was too close, and she smacked him upside the head. “Your spit’s flying, idiot!” she scolded, annoyed, but secretly she was happy for the compliment. She and Naruto hadn’t been interacting lately (not that she could blame him, considering the angry aura she had been emitting that past week. Even he wasn't dense enough to mess with that).

Although she wouldn’t admit it, their lack of meaningful contact bothered her slightly, because she was so used to his presence.

Sasuke-kun was staring at her, she realized, and her face heated up. She excitedly met his gaze, and she was ecstatic to see that although they lacked approval, there was no more disapproval in his beautiful, heart-stopping, super-dreamy orbs.

Inner threw a party in her head.

“Good job, Sakura,” Sensei complimented after jumping out of a tree. “But who’s going to explain to Madam Shijimi—the damiyo’s wife, may I remind you—why her precious cat is missing its whiskers?”

Sakura’s eyes widened, and she promptly decided to pull a Kakashi-sensei and leave. “Sorry, I told Ino-pig I’d meet her right about now!” she exclaimed over her shoulder after handing Tora to Naruto, preparing to make an exit. “See you!”

And then she _ran,_ praying that Sensei wouldn’t bother to catch her as she made her daring escape to Ino.

♟

**Konoha, April 13**

Sakura awoke leisurely the following day.

It was Team 7’s day off, and she planned to make the best of it, which really just meant relaxing and reading cheesy romances while giggling under her covers as the heroine kissed the hero for the first time.

She didn’t leave her room until noon, opting to sit back and write a letter to Tsunami-san, in which she discussed her training briefly, but mainly focused on her “friend/enemy, Ino-pig”, “lazy sensei”, “clumsy teammate, Naruto”, and “super-cool teammate Sasuke-kun”.

She was soon satisfied with the note. After securing it in an addressed envelope, she got changed and left to send the mail off. Nothing much occurred during her journey as she happily strolled through the village she grew up in, however, in accordance to the gossip going around the civilian district, the whereabouts of Fukui Achikita and his son, Akiyo, were still unknown.

She frowned as she made her way home.

She was only gone for fifteen minutes, but when Sakura got back home, a black-haired man was sitting on her porch, a stern yet irritated expression on his face.

Warily, she made her way to him. “Good afternoon,” she greeted politely, and the unknown man began to stand up. “I’m Haruno Sakura, I live here—may I help you?”

He didn’t return her greeting. “Kizashi’s kid?” he asked.

Sakura nodded, confused.

“The name’s Inomatsu,” he introduced. “Kizashi was supposed to meet me an hour ago at the village gate. We have a mission,” Inomatsu-san scowled.

Sakura furrowed her eyebrows. “There must be a mistake,” she started. “My father’s been on a mission outside the village for the past week...”

Inomatsu-san sent an unimpressed look her way. “Hokage-sama was very clear about his instructions regarding the mission two weeks ago,” he stated, scoffing quite rudely.

This made no sense, Sakura decided. She had to stop herself from groaning loudly; she should have read that letter her father left on the kitchen counter instead of making assumptions.

_Damn it._

“Please, give me a minute to check the note my father left,” Sakura explained (but she didn’t invite him in, because the entire situation seemed sketchy. Something was _wrong_ , an adamant voice repeated in her head.)

The girl made her way to the kitchen and grabbed the envelope without hesitation, only to be surprised at the weight she felt. A pendant fell out; she recognized the chain as the one that was constantly wrapped around her father’s neck, but the actual necklace was always tucked into his obi, so she hadn’t seen it.

It was chipped at the edges, and although the charm was clearly meant to be a cherry blossom, it looked more like her father’s head. The majority of the star-shaped jewelry was colored a pale pink, besides one triangle, which was a deep purple.

Sakura dropped the pendant onto the counter, heart racing because the fact that she had never seen it before meant her father never took it off, so something was wrong, wrong, _wrong_ —

She opened the letter, and everything froze.

_Dear Mebuki and Sakura,_

_To whoever finds this, please go to the police station and tell the officer to open the door to my bedroom. Don’t be alarmed, but I decided that I couldn’t take the world anymore and have made the decision to end my life._

For a moment Sakura didn’t move. She stood there, searching the entirety of the letter, skimming the instructions her father left in search for the punchline, because there was no way this was real.

It couldn’t be real, right? It had to be a practical joke or a cruel prank. She bet that her father was reading some dumb book listing supposedly hilarious puns in his room, giggling while eating pre-packed potato chips and other junk food—

Sakura found no punchline, and within the blink of an eye she was at her parents’ bedroom, pulling at the door handle desperately in an attempt to open it, but it wouldn’t budge, so she used all her body weight and slammed herself into the wood repeatedly until her side ached, and when that didn’t work she sent chakra to the soles of her feet just like in Wave and _kicked_ —

The door fell off its hinges, and Sakura fell to her knees, because hanging from the ceiling fan was her father, and she screamed instinctually, and the only thing she could think was _my fault my fault my fault my fault—_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ So I wanted to drop by and share this timeline of Naruto I found online and am using for this story (click [HERE](https://naruto.fandom.com/wiki/User:Seelentau/Naruto_Timeline)) - it's amazingly well-researched and super helpful!  
> ✿ The next chapter may take a while, because I'm stuck on how to deal with the aftermath, but hopefully it won't take too long!


	9. Aftermath and Altered Plans

guilt is rage built within an inescapable cage, simmering and rip-roaring.

♟

**Konoha, April 13**

Sakura could recite the stages of decomposition word-for-word, but once again, all her studying at the Academy had failed to prepare her adequately for reality, because the actual thing was much more vivid than the diagrams.

Papa’s body was bloated, blood was leaking from his eyes, and the stench of his decaying vessel was unbearable. It caused the thirteen-year-old to bend over and vomit on the carpeted floor, her breakfast unable to stay put in her stomach.

Sobs continued to rock her body. She looked up at his discolored face, which was once a beautiful, sun-kissed tan. Her eyes then traveled to his neck, where the belt had clearly cut into Papa’s skin to the point that, if he was alive, Sakura was certain that not even medical chakra could heal the deep abrasion. 

She waited.

Sakura prayed for the scene in front of her to simply _disappear,_ hoping that it was just a joke, or a delusion, or a dream.

Sakura wished that it was anything but what was in front of her, however, it didn’t disappear.

Instead, the body was still there (which was dead, dead, _dead_ ), what remained of Papa hanging from his neck by the ceiling fan, and she wailed again and again and _again_ , because some part of her knew that this event wasn’t supposed to happen, just like Koyo wasn’t supposed to hurt her—

Haruno Sakura was supposed to have a normal, happy life, one she would approach with the eyes of a civilian child, untainted by the shinobi world—

There was something wrong with this timeline, with this dimension—

Maybe she was still trapped in a skilfully placed genjutsu by Sensei that she had failed to break out of, so this was a cruel, vivid illusion, because this couldn’t be real, this couldn’t be real, this couldn’t be _fucking_ real—

The girl reached to touch the pulse point on her neck in order to feel her heart, which was beating in rapid thumps, and she knew that it was all too real as she rocked back and forth to the sound.

She didn’t remember what happened after that; she vaguely knew that there was a lot of screaming, but she couldn’t make the explicit connection that it was her voice.

♟

**Land of Medicines, April 13**

The Land of Medicines surrounded the tall, “Three Wolves” mountains, one of the peaks being home to the Howling Wolf Village, which was Itachi’s destination at the time. It was where he would find the hypnotic illusionary medication called Katarō, which he used as eye drops to extend his life-force.

Feet infused with chakra, he climbed up the rocky terrain, observing the sky dotted with silver clouds. He wondered if his brother, Sasuke, was witnessing the same sight at that moment.

Suddenly, he felt _it_ from behind him.

It was the presence of the man who had killed Itachi’s genin teammate, Tenma; the same man who had later helped Itachi massacre the Uchiha and had offered him his position in the Akatsuki.

“Madara,” Itachi greeted as he turned around, continuing to pretend that the person with the orange mask wasn’t but a pathetic shell of the real Uchiha Madara.

“Itachi,” he acknowledged, voice deep as he stepped out of the spiralling void that had transported him to his location. He looked around. “What a shame; I was hoping Kisame would be here, too.”

“Is there something you need?” Itachi questioned, voice carefully monotone.

“I see you’re still as untrusting as ever,” Madara grunted.

Pause.

“I’ve taken on an apprentice. I imagine you know of her? Haruno Sakura—”

Without hesitation, Itachi activated his Sharingan, the red of his eyes gleaming threateningly under the moonlight. “She's my brother's teammate,” he said pointedly. “We had an agreement, Madara.”

“I recall,” the older Uchiha stated flatly. “I do not plan on nearing your little brother, so calm down.”

Although Itachi relaxed his stance, his Sharingan remained activated. Madara was teetering dangerously close to his brother, and Itachi had no doubt in his mind that this new... _development_ had something to do with Sasuke.

A few months ago, when Sasuke was set to graduate to genin, Itachi had done a basic background check on his teammates. He could recall Haruno Sakura’s profile: civilian-born, and although she excelled academically, it was certainly nothing special enough to garner the attention of the man who controlled the Akatsuki from behind the shadows.

“What are your motivations?” Itachi asked bluntly.

Madara tilted his head to the side cockily. “That’s for me to know, and for you to not question.”

Itachi considered his options. He could fight Madara right then and there, and realistically, he could win—

But certainly not without high-difficulty, thus adding strain to his already decaying body.

Itachi couldn’t succumb to his sickness just yet. He had to live long enough die by Sasuke’s hand. Thus, he listened patiently to the masked man’s orders.

“Anyhow, the reason for my visit,” Madara began. “As of right now, my apprentice has the potential to be a strong kunoichi in her own right, but she’s missing a... _trump card_ ,” he expanded. “For that, I require your genjutsu prowess.”

Pause.

“Meet me at The Base on July 21stfor a mission. We’re going kekkei genkai hunting.”

And then Madara used his ability to teleport away, and Itachi was left wondering what game was being played, and how it involved Sasuke.

♟

**Konoha, April 13**

Kakashi exhaled.

His hand was resting on Sakura’s forehead as he evaluated her temperature for the nth time in the span of a few hours. He had laid her down on her bed, where eventually she had fallen asleep, but despite being in a state of unconsciousness, excess water still leaked from his student’s shut eyes.

The girl had cried herself into a fever, her face red and puffy, her tear-stained cheeks being the evidence of the hysteria she had experienced.

(He dully noted that her reaction was very different from his. When Kakashi found his father’s deceased body, he had merely balled up his fists, grit his teeth and let the bitterness consume him.

Sakura, on the other hand, was, for the lack of a better term, an emotional wreck.)

Since her mother was outside of Konoha and her father was now _dead_ , Kakashi was the one who was contacted. His first thought when Sandaime-sama summoned him to tell him the news was that it wasn’t supposed to be like this; Sakura’s father was not destined to die by suicide.

The legendary White Fang showed every sign in the book. Haruno Kizashi did not, thus he simply wasn’t the type to _kill himself_ —

Admittedly, he had only encountered Kizashi once, but the revered Copy Ninja was adept at seeing underneath the underneath; Kakashi met Sakura’s father the same day he had his first meeting with Team 7, and her parents invited him and Hokage-sama into their house for tea.

The pink-haired man seemed like a charismatic, jovial person, if not a little... _intense_.

Furthermore, the playful dynamic he had with his wife, Haruno Mebuki, indicated that his marriage was very loving, and it was clear that he cared for his daughter.

Kakashi could only come to one conclusion, and that was that Sakura’s father was not a man who wanted to actively die, therefore, this decision was made suddenly and on a whim.

But what could have possibly triggered such a decision? He didn't know.

Kakasi abruptly felt a hand on his shoulder. Turning his gaze, he was met by Gai, who, as per always, was at his side, ready to support him through thick and thin.

(He could imagine a younger Kakashi pushing his hand away, but he was no longer young. He was now mature enough to know the importance of bonds, because they could be so _fleeting_ , and he was reminded of that fact yet again.)

“They’re taking the body to the morgue,” Gai said simply.

The masked man hummed.

Asuma and Gai were outside the Hokage’s office when he had been summoned to hear the news of his female student’s father, and they insisted on coming along to help him, worry in their eyes as Kakashi watched the all-too-familiar scene play out in front of him helplessly.

He was thankful, too, because Asuma, alongside his former student, Inomatsu, were ensuring that Inoichi, not that sadist, Ibiki, interview Sakura. Gai, on the other hand, was dealing with the police, meaning Kakashi could simply _sit_ with his student and _be there_.

He knew that comforting really wasn’t his thing. Sakura always needed the most comforting out of all his genin, and Kakashi would give her what she needed.

(Or at least he would try.)

♟

The entrance to Sakura’s house was wide open. A member of the Konoha Military Police Force exited to greet Ino’s father and began to brief him on the situation, awe-stricken at meeting the prodigious head of the Yamanaka clan—

—Ino ignored this, however, instead breaking into a run to find Sakura.

Ino heard the footsteps of Shikamaru and Chōji behind her, who had insisted on being there for support. She instinctively ended up at Sakura’s bedroom, where the duo used to have sleepovers as children, and she swung the door open, only to see a man in a green jumpsuit and Sakura’s instructor, Kakashi-sensei, looming over her friend’s body.

Tears began to block Ino’s view as she saw her friend lying in bed: Sakura’s face looked too worn for her age. 

Her lips were curled into a heart-wrenching frown, and worry lines donned her forehead. She was shivering, too, but at the same time, her skin was glistening with sweat.

Ino opened and closed her mouth multiple times, trying to figure out what to say, before she settled on asking, “How is she?” If her voice broke, no one commented.

“She has a fever,” Kakashi-sensei informed quietly, and he began to move away as she neared Sakura.

Hesitantly, she called out her friend’s name.

Sakura’s eyes opened, green orbs lacking focus. “Cold,” she rasped, and without hesitation Ino got under the covers with her, pulling her friend’s shivering body into a protective embrace.

(Ino didn’t even care that snot stained her clothing, nor did she care that she was at a risk for catching the sickness herself; her only priority was keeping Sakura warm.)

♟

At some point, everybody left.

The ridiculously-dressed man, Gai, had to go meet with his own genin team.

Asuma-sensei was suddenly beckoned on a two-day mission to the Green Banks.

Shikamaru and Chōji’s parents came to pick them up, telling them they had to go. However, her teammates he promised that they would drop by first thing in the morning, and her teammates always kept their promises.

Ino’s father decided that Sakura was in no shape to take part of an interview, and although he intended to stay, he was called in by T&I. He didn’t return until early in the morning.

Kakashi-sensei was still there, _technically_ , but he was sitting in the living room, a far-away look in his eyes.

Ino stayed the entire night with Sakura.

She didn’t particularly believe in a God, but she hoped someone was hearing her nonsensical prayers.

♟

**Konoha, April 14**

Sakura only recalled glimpses of the following day. She would occasionally wake up to ask for water, the thirst in the back of her throat becoming unbearable.

Ino would grab her chin and help her gulp down a glass-full, and the pink-haired girl burned blue, pupil-less eyes into her memory, dimly realizing that Ino was always a constant in her life.

(Ino, who had always fought for her; Ino, who had a tired face and bloodshot eyes as she nursed Sakura back to health, waking up at odd hours to help her; Ino, who was always there for her—

—Sakura didn't deserve Ino.)

♟

That afternoon, the spring sun was so unfittingly bright, it was almost inappropriate. Kakashi stood at Team 7's meeting spot, staring blankly at the scene in front of him.

Kakashi was four hours late to training, opting to completely ditch his male students without any warning or reason in favor of avoiding this conversation, but he couldn't avoid it any longer—

Naruto and Sasuke were sitting on the red bridge with considerable distance between them, the former being quick to shout at the white-haired man and the latter glaring daggers at him for being a no-show, and therefore wasting their time.

Once his students got their anger out of their systems, Kakashi cleared his throat and swallowed.

"Sakura's not well," he said simply.

The genin in front of him stiffened.

"Her father died of suicide. She's at her house, with a stress-induced fever."

An awkward silence hung over the trio. Kakashi wasn't surprised; he gave the news bluntly, completely lacking finesse (because his emotional capacity was less than that of Mr. Ukki, a plant), and both Naruto and Sasuke didn't have the best record regarding social etiquette, either.

Naruto snapped out of it first. "Take us to her," he demanded, voice low and shaky with emotion.

He glanced at Sasuke, whose head was lowered, his bangs falling gracefully over his forehead, and hands balled up into shaking fists. He nodded curtly.

Kakashi turned around and began to make his way to the Haruno household, his students following closely behind him.

(When they entered the bedroom, if he could sense Sasuke’s guilt for ignoring Sakura for the better part of the previous week, or his anger that Ino, Shikamaru and Chōji found out about Sakura before him and Naruto despite them being on her team, Kakashi didn’t mention it.

He also didn’t mention the out-of-place, awkward aura that followed Naruto, who didn’t know how to deal with losing a loved one, because he thought he barely had anyone who didn’t hate him, let alone _love_ him.)

♟

Naruto, and his teammate and rival, Sasuke, were eavesdropping.

They were on their way to Ichiraku’s to get some food for everyone—a position Naruto proudly volunteered the two of them for—when they saw Ino’s father outside the house.

The man was talking to a police officer who mentioned “Haruno Kizashi”, and the boys gave each other a single look, before promptly ducking behind a building and masking their presences. Naruto saw the bastard, Sasuke, swallow as he listened, causing Naruto to swallow anxiously, too.

"It was done on a whim, I think,” said the nervous officer, who was fidgeting under the scrutiny of Ino’s father.

(Naruto wondered why everyone was acting like Ino’s father was such a hotshot, anyways. He didn’t look like much, and Naruto bet that if they fought, the younger boy would definitely win—Naruto suddenly slapped himself lightly across the face, willing himself to focus on the conversation occurring in front of him without any distractions.)

“In the suicide note, the deceased gave no motive besides vaguely mentioning ‘guilt’, I think.”

Pause.

“In the letter, he seemed out of it, I think—I mean, he only talked about the finances, like insurance, mortgage, debt, etcetera. The deceased even mentioned watering the plants, I think, but he didn’t even say ‘I love you’ or ‘sorry’ to his family, I think. Just... ‘goodbye’ and ‘see you soon’...”

Pause.

Ino’s father sighed, and then pinched the bridge of his nose as the rookie officer scurried away.

Pause.

“You can come out now, boys,” he said, glancing in the direction of Sasuke and Naruto knowingly, before going back inside. 

♟

****Konoha, April 15****

_Sakura was back in Wave, at the clearing where everything went_ wrong _._

_Koyo was against a tree, arms crossed over his chest, head twisted and hanging loosely from his body at an inhumane angle. She stared, wide-eyed and terrified._

_She knew that, realistically, it was probably a nightmare, but no matter how much she tried, she couldn’t will herself to wake up. She also wasn't certain of the difference between reality and her vivid visions, unable to pinpoint the difference._

_At first, Koyo was silent, and then he wasn’t. “Kid, you know this is fucking karma, right?” he snapped._

_“What...?” Sakura murmured, dazed and confused._

_“You remember that time you told Sasuke that Naruto was annoying because he had no parents to teach him how to behave?”_

_Sakura swallowed thickly, knowing that the real Koyo would have no knowledge about her team, so this had to be a dream..._

_...right?_

_“That was a long time ago...”_

_Pause._

_"And that has nothing to do with what Papa did...” she said, shaking her head. “It wasn’t my fault...”_

_“Then who’s fault was it?” Koyo questioned dryly. “Do you seriously think it was a coincidence; that your father just decided to fucking_ kill himself _when he found out about Wave for shits and giggles?”_

_“It wasn’t my fault,” she repeated weakly. However, her protest went unheard._

_Koyo began to walk towards her. “If only you hadn’t taken the trail to the right that day—"_

_“Be quiet...” Sakura whimpered, walking backwards as he pushed her to the ground._

_“Or if only you hadn’t decided to play fucking_ hero _and interfere to save the life of that worthless woman—”_

_“No...” she voiced as he pulled out three kunai leisurely, face hanging from his broken neck as he met her eyes cruelly (and those haunting, hazel eyes, Sakura could never forget)._

_“Or if only you were strong enough to fight me off before I could use you like a_ tool— _”_

_“Stop...” Sakura told him as he stabbed her hands into the ground, and rapidly slit her shorts._

_“Or if only you had the courage to confront him after Wave, or if only you checked the envelope he left earlier—_

_“STOP!” she cried as the weapon violated her, but her command was directed at the words Koyo was saying, because she was getting crushed under the weight of the blame and guilt. “IT WASN’T MY FAULT, IT WASN’T—”_

“ _—_ MY FAULT!” Sakura screamed, sitting up, drenched in a thin layer of sweat. Her eyes were wide open as she stared into the space in front of her, where green irises were met by bright blue.

_Naruto._

He was at the foot of her bed, and Sasuke-kun was at his right, and Kakashi-sensei was behind Sasuke-kun. The room was silent, and Sakura could hear her own breath echoing in her ears as she cautiously scanned her bedroom.

Inoichi-san was there, looking at Sakura analytically, and she almost couldn’t recognize him as his eyes hardened into that of a doctor doing his job; he wasn’t just her friend’s father anymore.

She glanced to her right, where Ino was sitting, exhaustion evident on her face. Sakura witnessed her ex-friend go through a series of emotions, before she settled on pursing her lips together into a thin line.

Sakura’s voice cracked as she spoke. “What happened?” she questioned, because the only memory she could come up with was the dream she just had of that _monster,_ who told her that her father _killed himself_ (and there was no way on earth that was real, she decided.)

It was Kakashi-sensei who spoke first. “You had a fever,” he said cautiously, looking at her as if she would shatter into a thousand pieces.

Sakura thought for a moment, before she smiled.

“Oh,” she murmured, releasing a sigh of relief.

It was all making sense; she had come to the conclusion that everything was a terrible, terrible nightmare caused by her fever—meaning, none of it was real!

“I just had the worst dream,” she explained, ecstatic that the entire ordeal was just that: a dream! “I thought that my father killed himself...” she started, barely audible, before she shook her head, grinning. “Never mind. It’s all okay now!”

“Sakura...” Ino began, not meeting her gaze.

She suddenly noted that everyone was looking away awkwardly, and chills ran down the pink-haired girl’s spine as she caught on to the tense atmosphere.

“I’m sorry, but..."

Ino swallowed.

"It wasn’t a dream, Sakura...” the blonde said, grasping her hand weakly.

The world froze. “You’re lying,” Sakura defended quickly, annoyed (because... why was Ino lying to her?! About such a serious and scary topic, too!)

Ino shook her head slowly, and her heart leaped to her throat.

“Oh,” was all Sakura could bring herself to whisper.

A minute passed, and the pink-haired girl just stared at her lap.

(Then, the memories began to rush back, and Sakura couldn’t deal with it, because this was not supposed to happen—

The timeline was all wrong—

And good god, all Sakura could think was _my fault, my fault, my fault—_ )

“Sensei,” Sakura murmured, arms hugging her frail form as she stood up, only to trip on her own two feet. This caused Naruto to catch and stabilize her, however she flinched out of his hold, missing the short-lived hurt look on the blond’s face. She quickly met her teacher’s dark irises.

She swiftly got to her knees, tears trekking down her face as she placed her forehead on the floor, bowing down to Kakashi-sensei. She couldn’t care less about her dignity in that moment.

“Sensei, you know a thousand jutsu, right?” she blabbered, voice muddled and earnest at the same time. “Please, I’m begging you to use one of your jutsu to bring back my father. Please, I’ll do anything...!”

Pause.

Warily, Sakura glanced up at Sensei’s masked face.

He simply shook his head. “I’m sorry, Sakura... I don’t know such a jutsu.”

The world seemed to be breaking around her.

Inoichi-san cut into their interaction like a knife. “Sakura-chan,” he said softly, helping her up and guiding her back to her bed, “Sit, and _breathe_.”

The man then glanced at his daughter, who proceeded to look at Sakura.

“Forehead,” Ino addressed out of habit. “You must be hungry,” she stated, attempting a lopsided smile. However, her lips quivered and her hands wiped away stray tears.

(Sakura wasn’t focusing on that, however. Instead, she felt this sudden, all-consuming rage travel from her stomach to her cheeks; she couldn’t tell exactly where she went wrong, but it was all _her_ fault, because Papa’s death was triggered by _her_ incompetent actions in Wave, and she hated herself for it.)

Ino reached for the nightstand and grabbed a bowl, holding the chopsticks between shaky fingers. She then picked up whatever food was in the bowl, and held what was ramen in front of Sakura, waiting for the pink-haired girl to open her mouth—

—but all Sakura felt was anger, self-hatred, regret, and more anger, and all she saw in the dangling noodles was the belt Papa was hanging by, and she _burst_.

Sakura slapped the food out of Ino’s hands, body shaking and breath heaving, the bowl falling to the floor and cracking into pointy shards.

Silence.

Sakura began to immediately feel guilty as she looked at Ino, who’s tired face went from being shocked to being at the edge of a breakdown within seconds. Furthermore, she couldn’t even bring herself to glance at Naruto and Sasuke-kun, knowing that it was them who took the time to buy the food, because who else would purchase tomato-flavored ramen?

Before she could apologize, however, she smelt the scent of the meat in the ramen. Her gag reflex reacted as she remembered the smell of Papa’s decomposing body—

She found herself in her toilet, lurching her guts out with Kakashi-sensei at her side, who was rubbing soothing circles on her back. He was murmuring words that Sakura couldn’t absorb, her mind too busy with the sudden hysteria.

As soon as she had nothing left to spew out of her stomach, she stood up, darting for the door because something within told her that she had to leave.

Sensei grabbed her by her wrist. “Where are you going?” he inquired firmly, pulling her back.

“Training grounds,” Sakura replied absently, already planning her katas, because she needed to do something to release this crippling and self-destructive anger from within.

“You’re still sick,” he tried to tell her, but she struggled out of his grasp like a rabid animal, purposefully sending chakra to the soles of her feet to aid her daring escape.

Kakashi-sensei suddenly pulled her back by her shoulders with enough force that she fell on her behind. Nonetheless, she continued to struggle.

“I said _no_. As your instructor, I won’t allow it,” he asserted. “Now, sit down.”

Sakura didn’t know where it came from, but she cussed at him. “Fuck you!” she told him, and while he didn’t react, she caught Naruto twitch from her peripheral vision.

It was as if she was regressing into the little girl she was in the Academy, because she began to cry loudly like a child.

“You don’t understand!” she hiccupped, prattling incoherently. “I hate you!” she spat.

Sakura knew she didn’t mean it, and she shouldn’t have said it, but she continued anyways.

“I hate you all, because you don’t understand!”

Suddenly, Sensei pulled her into his chest, and it took Sakura a moment to comprehend that he was _hugging_ her.

She couldn’t believe it; her impassive, apathetic teacher was showing that he cared. He didn’t have to comfort her, but he was doing it despite the task not being in the job description.

“Trust me: I understand,” he began. “I understand,” he emphasized.

Sakura wailed, loud and ugly. “Kakashi-sensei I swear I didn’t know,” she said, unintelligible thoughts reflecting in her words. “I thought he was at a mission, and then I checked the letter, and then his body was just _hanging_ and—”

A sob escaped her lips.

“Hush,” he cooed. “I know. I know.”

He held her until her booming cries turned into repetitive hiccups. Sakura couldn’t focus on anything but Sensei’s heartbeat echoing in her ears, and eventually, the sound lulled her to sleep.

♟

**Suna, April 15**

Obito was a meticulous planner.

Ever since he dedicated his aimless existence to the Eye of the Moon plan, he thought years in advance, remaining ten steps ahead of different important entities, such as the Akatsuki or Kirigakure.

Furthermore, for every step, he thoughtfully considered multiple outcomes, and for each outcome, he considered his next steps.

However, Haruno Sakura wasn’t a part of his plan.

He thought back to the, admittedly, valid question Itachi asked a few days ago; what were Obito’s motivations with the girl? He himself didn’t know, and he realized that, realistically, she wasn’t anything special.

Sakura was average and expendable, meaning that if he wanted an apprentice, he should have picked someone with more potential—

—but he had been overly-reminiscent of Rin, allowing his emotions to guide his judgement, and now, due to his weakness, he had to think of some way she could be of use to him.

Annoyed, he sat up from his laying position. He was staying at a Suna inn to monitor Orochimaru, who Zetsu discovered was planning an upcoming assassination of the Yondaime Kazekage. Apparently Sunagakure, alongside the recently-formed village, Otogakure (which was founded by the snake Sannin himself) would later invade Konoha during the upcoming Chunin Exams.

Obito didn’t plan on interfering with Orochimaru’s plans, instead opting to simply watch, seeing this as an opportunity to allow enough havoc in the shinobi world to occur so his own crimes would go unnoticed.

(That, and perhaps what was now being dubbed Konoha Crush could aid in helping his apprentice realize her full... potential. Obito decided a wake-up call was in order.)

♟

**Konoha, April 15**

Meanwhile, a few minutes before Hayate had to leave for a mission, he made his way to the village gates, lighting a cigarette (and hoping that Yūgao wouldn’t jump out of nowhere and reprimand him for starting again, when he promised he would quit smoking).

As he walked through the civilian district, however, he heard the unrestrained, shameless whispers:

“That poor girl,” one woman said. “I heard that she was the one who found her father’s body.”

The man she was talking to huffed condescendingly. “I heard that he had been hanging there for six days before she thought to check. Wasn’t this Sakura kid supposed to be a ninja or whatever?” he questioned. “I mean, how could someone miss something like _that_?”

Hayate made the connection: Sakura, the pink-haired girl from the library.

_Oh._

How unfortunate. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ Oof I'm sorry that was actual trash. I really didn't know how to deal with the situation eek.  
> ✿ However, the plot finally picks up in the next chapter: Obito... whisks Sakura away! And we witness a paranoid Sakura deal with the guilt and her mother.  
> ✿ Comment your guesses for this mysterious kekkei genkai :)


	10. Hot Water

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PLEASE READ: This is very important, and I would really love all your opinion on it, so please leave some comments! 
> 
> I've been having an internal debate about this for a while, however, would you prefer for this fanfic to comply to the majority of canon events as we near Shippuden (such as Sasuke leaving, the war arc, etc), or would you rather this be mostly canon divergent? 
> 
> I personally think that canon divergent would be more satisfying as I feel like if I follow the timeline, firstly, the story will be too long, and secondly, it will defeat the purpose of exploring the butterfly effect. However, let me know your opinions! :)

so terrified, knowing it was all a massive lie _—_ and yet, he, out of all people, felt like an ally.

♟

**Konoha, April 17**

Verdant eyes fluttered open, and the first sensation Sakura experienced was the distant ache in her legs, arms, neck, back—everything hurt. Every damn thing, and she vaguely made the connection that she had bedsores from lying down for too long.

The second sensation Sakura experienced was this overwhelming, debilitating guilt that sat not only inside her head, but inside her chest, resting heavily within her. A sense of masochistic pleasure surfaced, because the she decided that she deserved to bear the painful way the shame throbbed, moving in time to the sluggish vibrations of her heart.

Then the young girl met the green irises of her mother.

At first, a distinct wave of anxiety pulsed through Sakura. However, that emotion was soon replaced by a vast, never-ending sea of self-blame and self-hatred, because the life in her mother’s face was _gone_ , the will made of flames extinguished and non-existent.

All Sakura could think was that it was all her fault, because not only did her incompetence take the life of her father, but it also stole the vibrant aura from her loving mother.

(If only she didn’t get hurt in Wave, or if only she was better at hiding the nightmares, or if only she saw the signs of deep self-hatred reflecting in Papa’s features the day he did _it_.

Regret pierced her like a thousand kunai.)

♟

Mama wasn’t the same, she noted numbly. Her blonde hair was in disarray. Her eyes were jaded hollows. Her green irises housed no happiness.

Because of this, her mother’s smile, despite how fragmented it was, caught her off-guard.

“You’re awake,” Mama murmured, relief evident in her tone as her soft hand caressed her daughter’s cheek, face overflowing with love that Sakura felt simply _didn’t belong._

She wanted her mother to yell at her. She yearned to be reprimanded, berated, and torn from the inside-out, limb by limb. She felt she deserved every ounce of the pain, and she wanted her guilt to be validated by the woman who loved her father the most.

She longed to be released, something that could only occur if she was blamed, allowing justice to prevail.

However, the release didn’t come, and all Sakura could think was _why doesn’t Mama hate me—_

She recoiled from her mother’s touch, missing the hurt look that fell over the older woman’s face. A moment of silence passed, and soon, a cough was heard echoing throughout the room.

It was from a member of the Konoha Military Police Force, who she just then realized was standing in the corner, next to Inoichi-san.

“Sweetheart,” her mother called quietly, voice filled with gentle sadness. “I know this is hard, but the policeman here needs a statement from you.”

The pink-haired girl blinked. “Oh,” she murmured numbly, before sitting up.

She might as well get it over with, she decided, and so she spit it all out:

“The day it happened, I fell asleep in the woods after training for too long the night before. I went home to get dressed, but Otou-san was in his room, so I didn’t see him. Then I trained with Sensei, completed missions with my team, trained with my friend, Ino, and studied at the library for the rest of the day.”

Sakura hoped her lies, which were subtly mixed in with truths, weren’t recognized.

The officer, who was taking notes, spoke up nonchalantly. “What time did you get home?” he questioned.

She thought for a moment. “About 10:00 PM.”

Pause.

Sakura swallowed. “I saw a letter on the kitchen counter, but I assumed it was just him telling me he was going on a mission, so I didn’t check,” she said, voice breaking. “The next few days, there was a... smell, but the door was locked, and I thought it was just plumbing.”

Pause.

“Then Inomatsu-san came to find Otou-san, so I checked the note, and...”

She couldn’t bring herself to continue.

Silence hung in the room as the officer scribbled something down, his hard expression unnerving. Then, he asked, “Did your father act somewhat... _strange_ before that day?”

Everything hinged on her next words, Sakura realized. She already learned the hard way that _bad things_ occurred if people discovered the truth about Wave.

“I saw he wasn’t really... present. As in, his eyes weren’t responsive, but I—I didn’t think it was a big deal,” she explained cautiously, voice ridden with shame as she stammered. Her nails were digging into her palms, and she refused to meet anyone’s gaze.

The officer pursed his lips, evidently frustrated with her vague responses. “Do you know any reason your father would kill himself?” he asked bluntly, and panic consumed Sakura, because replying meant she would have to admit the truth about the incident in Wave—

“That’s enough,” Inoichi-san cut in suddenly, and the officer shrunk in his seat.

“It’s standard procedure, sir—”

“I said _that’s enough_.”

The officer nodded hastily, before scurrying out of the room.

Sakura remained still for a moment, before hugging her knees, feeling herself depersonalize.

♟

**Konoha, April 18**

Mebuki was steadily approaching the end of her rope.

She came back from Kusagakure two days ago, not suspecting that anything was wrong, only to learn from Kuroyagi-san that her husband had _killed himself_.

At first, she was completely blindsided, and she couldn’t believe it whatsoever, remaining adamant that Kizashi would never do such a thing.

( _"He had never shown any signs!_ ” she had said. _“There were no pre-attempts, no ‘cries for help’!_ ”)

It took Inoichi-san personally telling her the truth and showing her the note for her to stop denying it.

The note; it had sent chills up her spine, because in the letter, the man she loved was so disconnected. He strictly mentioned insignificant, economic instructions (such as _“don’t forget to collect the insurance to get rid of the debt_ ”) before he decided to take his own life.

The minor administrative details clashed with the life-changing decision so spectacularly, it was wholly unnerving.

After the initial shock wore off, Mebuki’s maternal instincts kicked in, and she proceeded to nurse her daughter back to health, all the while starting preparations for the funeral. The days leading up to Sakura’s recovery were full of private despair, only it was the type equivalent to losing the other half of oneself.

When Mebuki was certain she couldn’t possibly cry anymore, she found herself crying on the living room floor.

However, she felt a calmness within when she met her daughter’s open eyes. Finally, she could have someone to hold as she mourned—

Only Sakura looked right through her, face stormy with anger. It was a trait she inherited from her mother, Mebuki recognized, just as she inherited her green eyes and slightly wide forehead.

However, Sakura’s anger was directed at no one other than Sakura herself.

(Inoichi-san assured Mebuki that self-blame was a normal reaction in children.

The woman felt rage begin to boil in the pit of her stomach, because her husband’s decision screwed up the loving family they spent years building together—it was as if he dropped a bomb right in the middle of it, and everything exploded, with him not having to deal with the consequences of his actions.)

♟

**Konoha, April 19**

Her daughter was steadily getting worse, and Mebuki didn’t know what to do.

Whenever she saw Sakura, she was in the fetal position, feigning sleep and refusing to respond to her calls, even though they both knew she was wide awake—Sakura had visible bags under her eyes that were colored like bruises.

She found her baby girl curled into herself everywhere; in the bed, on the floor, in the bath, where the water was scorching hot to the touch.

Mebuki’s heart just _broke_.

(The woman knew that her own temper was growing, only, unlike her daughter, Mebuki’s fury was directed at her deceased husband, and not at herself.

How _dare_ Kizashi leave such a vague note with no ‘I love you’? How _dare_ he abandon her, all alone, with a child? How _dare_ he do things in such a way that Sakura found his body, making her unresponsive and devoid of light—

How _dare_ he act so selfish, leaving his burdens, and then some, behind?)

♟

**Konoha, April 20**

Sakura knew that avoiding sleep could potentially cause paranoia, but she was absolutely certain that her thoughts were completely and utterly rational (and if Inner was more explosive than usual, and if she hated the person she saw in the mirror with a burning passion, she didn’t acknowledge it).

Her mother was deceiving her, Sakura had decided after much thought. The woman who birthed her was playing a manipulative, calculating game, putting up a worried and loving facade—

—however, the reality of the situation was that Mama was secretly _seething_ on the inside; she was just waiting for the right moment to let her rage out, and soon she’d be spewing the truth about her feelings, saying how she _loathed_ her daughter to a larger degree than how much Sakura loathed herself.

Sakura wanted to feel her mother’s hatred like repeated stabs to the neck, so she purposefully discarded the funeral dress Mama took time to buy and threw on Papa’s oversized black cloak, which was the piece of clothing he wore for every mission.

She was yearning for some sort of reaction from her mother.

As Sakura made her way to the living room, she saw Mama on the couch. It was where her mother had been sleeping because she couldn’t get herself to stay in her bedroom, where her husband had killed himself.

She was staring intently at her hand, where Papa’s cherry blossom necklace rested.

Mama looked at Sakura, taking in her appearance, and visibly jerked, before contorting her lips into an awkward, toothy smile.

“You look just like him,” she told her, before clasping her father’s pendant on her daughter’s neck.

(Sakura wanted pain, but she got love, and she felt like she was losing her mind—)

Pointedly turning around, the pink-haired girl threw on the hood of the cloak as she made her way to the funeral site. She kept her head down, ignoring the not-so-subtle stares her neighbors were giving her.

She also blocked out the whispers as she watched her feet take one step, and then another, and then another.

 _‘Make them pay,’_ Inner commanded.

Sakura tried to ignore the tempting voice, and she continued to mask her burning fury as her mother bowed her head from besides her, shame evident on her face.

♟

The funeral passed in a flash.

One moment her father was lying there, face peaceful. She happily noted that the deep abrasion on his neck was gone. She couldn’t tell if it was healed or hidden with makeup.

The next moment, he was in the ground, buried six-feet under.

Her father was officially gone.

Mama was crying throughout the entire burial, but Sakura tried not to focus on her bawling. Instead, she looked around, surveying the people who were present. Team 7 was standing awkwardly in the back. Ino, her team, their parents and Inomatsu-san were also there.

(If she could feel their eyes on her whenever she wasn’t looking, she didn’t react.)

Her mouth twitched into a frown. Where were Papa’s friends?

Now that she thought about it, did Papa even have friends he could call his own? Was he always this lonely, but she had been too oblivious to notice?

Stupid, selfish Sakura.

♟

Before Sakura could comprehend it, she and her mother were standing in front of Kakashi-sensei and Inoichi-san.

Her mother bowed. “Thank you for being there for Sakura while I was gone,” she said, form angular.

Sakura didn’t mean for the scoff to escape her lips, but it just did.

Mama’s eyes widened, before her face gained an expression filled with admonition. “I raised you better than that,” her mother mumbled warningly. “Apologize. Now.”

Inoichi-san raised his hand. “No, Haruno-san it’s fine...”

Sakura turned around. She didn’t care about what anyone thought about her. Really.

She knew that everybody at the funeral talked about her when she wasn’t there, just like all the other villagers whispered about her incompetence as if their life depended on gossiping—

They all probably hated her, anyways.

She wasn’t going to be fooled by their “let’s be friends” act.

♟

That afternoon, Sakura wrapped herself in her blanket in her bed, staring at the ceiling numbly. She thought of everything and nothing at the same time, unwilling to think deeply about Papa.

And then suddenly, there was a big “whoosh” of air, causing her neck to snap to the right as she sat up.

Sakura didn’t know how to react when the man with the orange mask from Wave—whom she had nearly forgotten existed, let alone promised that they’d meet again—appeared out of a literal spiraling _void_ in her room, saying, “Hello, Sakura-chan!”

Instinctively, she jumped out of her bed and _screamed_ , previous grief be damned.

The man responded by flailing his arms comically, and suddenly covered her mouth with his hand to muffle her shocked shrieks. “Sakura-chan, don’t be scared!” he exclaimed. “It’s just me—Tobi-sensei!”

It was as if the fear sat directly over her lungs, allowing enough air intake to function, but preventing her from being able to breathe comfortably. She felt her body go into a cold sweat as she stared at the rogue ninja, wide-eyed and mildly terrified.

She swallowed, contemplating her next actions carefully.

The fresh-out-of-the-Academy genin had previously seen how powerful this Tobi person was, albeit only getting glimpses of his true strength. As Sakura analyzed the situation, she could already tell that he outclassed her by an immense margin, meaning she did _not_ want to get on his bad side; he quite literally just _teleported_ into her house.

She had to play along, Sakura decided, survival mode turning on.

“Sorry... you scared me,” she mumbled, voice muffled from behind his right hand. His skin there was unnaturally pale, she noted. And cold. Very cold.

Pause.

“Tobi-sensei,” she added cautiously, smiling weakly.

Pause.

The rogue ninja removed his hand, before giggling, voice pitched high.

“No problem, Sakura-chan!” he declared, while simultaneously patting her head, and she cringed as he flopped on to her bed carelessly. Her entire face pinched with worry as she considered the scenario in which her mother would hear the voice of a _grown_ _man_ in her bedroom.

Tobi-sensei sighed exaggeratedly.

“You have no idea how difficult it was to find your house,” he told her with feigned fatigue. “First, I had to ask around all of Wave for your full name—” he started, before shifting his train of thought with a child-like attention span. “Did you know that pink-haired kunoichi named ‘Sakura’ are surprisingly common in all five shinobi nations? I certainly didn’t!”

Sakura laughed awkwardly. “Sorry for the trouble...?” she squeaked.

A moment of silence passed.

“So... what are you doing here?” she questioned politely, attempting to remain soft-spoken as not to offend him.

Tobi-sensei chuckled. “So curious,” he remarked off-handedly, childish demeanor becoming serious.

(She decided that his no-nonsense mannerism was more than slightly terrifying. If she wasn’t about to piss herself before, she was definitely about to then.)

The man turned to lie on his side to face Sakura from where she stood. “It’s time to go on a little training trip,” he told her, as if it was a simple deduction. “You know, since you’re my _apprentice_.”

Sakura’s eyes widened, and she quickly thought of all the ways she could possibly get out of committing further treason—

—before she realized there was no getting out, because this rogue ninja had proven already to be dangerous, a fact amplified by his seemingly unstable personality.

Sakura nodded agreeably. “Alright!” she said enthusiastically, voice a little too loud, betraying her emotions. “How long will we be gone?” she asked, trying to ignore the way her hands were shaking from behind her back.

“Hmm...” Tobi-sensei thought for a moment. “Pack for about two days and two nights!”

The girl nodded and turned around, trying to hide her quaking knees as she began to make preparations. She treated it as if she was going on another mission, and neatly, she folded some clothing and stuffed it into her pack.

However, her brain was on overdrive as her racing thoughts ran rampant. _Would he kill her? Hurt her? How could she trust him? What would her village do if they ever found out? Was it truly too late to back out—?_

Before Sakura realized, her packing was done, and she only needed her shoes and cloak.

As if reading her mind, Tobi-sensei spoke. “I’ll meet you outside your neighborhood, in the park under the cherry blossom trees!” he declared happily, before casually making his way out of her window.

Sakura watched the space ahead of her, frozen and dumbfounded at what she got herself into.

Then, as if on autopilot, she made her way down the stairs, grabbing the black cloak on the dining room table. Sakura then sat on the steps and put on her sandals, standing up afterwards to secure her cloak.

Her mother’s abrupt presence caused her to tense as she was grabbing her travel pack, her sudden, monotone voice startling her.

“Where are you going?” Mama whispered, sounding dead.

Sakura worried at her bottom lip. What was she supposed to say? That she was going on a training trip with a missing nin? No way!

“I need some time,” she responded vaguely, mouth dry as she swallowed.

Pause.

Before Sakura could build enough courage to look over her shoulder, Mama’s quiet, broken and tired words sounded through the room.

“You’ll come back, right?” Mama asked, voice trembling.

Pause.

Sakura nodded.

“I’ll come back,” she affirmed. “I promise.”

And then she left, not having the nerve to look back.

♟

Obito ran on the rooftops of Konoha’s buildings, remaining in the shadows and masking his presence almost expertly. He had mastered the art of stealth a lifetime ago, at the young age of twelve, leaving him undetectable by anyone but sensor-types and few elite shinobi.

During his recovery all those years ago, when he used to lie in his bed, unable to move for basic tasks without falling flat on his face, Madara talked. A lot.

He taught him about nearly every ability in history, and Obito was able to incorporate this knowledge into the Eye of the Moon plan. It was thus nearly impossible to surprise him with any technique.

(The question was, could he bring this girl, Sakura, to a similar level? Or at least to a point where she would be of use?

Or should he simply kill her?)

Eventually, he made it to the abandoned Uchiha Compound, and despite seeing his vacant, childhood neighborhood, he didn’t flinch. The masked man didn’t even falter as he jumped over the apartment Obito used to live in with his grandmother—why should he, when Uchiha Obito died sixteen years ago, crushed by falling rocks during the war?

That pathetic boy held no relevance to Uchiha Madara, he had decided long ago.

The man ultimately entered the basement of the empty house of the head family, and after performing multiple hand signs, he unsealed top-secret scrolls holding valuable information regarding the Uchihas’ history not only with Konoha, but with other clans.

Hopefully, if the abilities listed in these scrolls were as powerful as Madara claimed they were, he could use them to strengthen his weak disciple.

Pocketing the scroll, Obito performed Kamui and teleported to their designated meeting spot.

As Obito left the shapeless void, he witnessed his cute little student wince, recoiling dramatically in alarm. Really, it was almost unfathomable that she was a genin based on how emotional she was—

—and then he recalled what an emotional wreck he was when he was only a few years younger than her, and he pursed his lips from behind his mask.

Anger suddenly filled him, one akin to when he saw Sasuke and Naruto only a month prior; what was the point of taking this child under his care, when she seemed to be more like that bastard, Kakashi, and a younger version of himself?

She should be acting more like Rin, who was rational; Rin, who was caring; Rin, who deserved the world.

“Hello!” Sakura squeaked.

“Aww!” Obito cooed. “You’re so cute, Sakura-chan!” he told her, cupping his face in a wonderstruck manner.

He wasn’t lying, either, even though he wouldn’t admit it. As infuriating as she could be for not being _enough_ like Rin, she was still an adorable kid.

“Let’s go!” he exclaimed enthusiastically, pumping his fist.

Her eyes widened in slight horror, before she schooled her features. “May I ask where we are going?” she questioned, suddenly timid.

Obito pretended to think for a moment, before saying, “Anywhere you want to go, Sakura-chan! Just say the name!”

She gulped, clearly noting the weight of the responsibility. “How about...” Sakura began, before restarting. “How about the Land of Hot Water? My mother told me that it’s very nice there...” she trailed off.

Obito nodded. “Great choice!” he cried, before placing a hand on her shoulder.

Sakura froze, stiffening at the sudden contact.

Pause.

Obito frowned.

“Do you trust me, Sakura-chan?”

No response.

“You can tell me the truth,” he promised. “I won’t get mad.”

Sakura’s breath hitched. After a long delay, and with extreme hesitance, the pink-haired girl shook her head slowly.

“It’s alright,” Obito re-assured, squeezing her shoulder. “Who would trust, after all you’ve been through, anyways?” he asked, seemingly to no one in particular.

To anyone on the outside, his words would seem deeply considerate and filled with genuine concern. However, Obito knew the truth; everything he was saying was manipulative and calculative. It was all a part of a larger plan to make her emotionally dependent on him, thus allowing her to be molded into the perfect pawn with ease. 

After a long pause, the man spoke again, “But I will prove to you that you can trust me—that’s a promise that will last for eternity!”

Sakura blinked, before nodding reluctantly. He noted that she relaxed her stance.

Grinning, he said loudly, “Now, let’s go!”

Obito then performed Kamui, registering the shocked face of his cute little student as they got sucked into the dimension connected with his Sharingan.

♟

The next thing Sakura knew was that she was face-down on a solid surface, and her forehead hurt. A lot.

She groaned and looked up, only to be met by Tobi-sensei, who was laughing hysterically at her predicament.

Her left eye twitched, and she felt her face flush due to embarrassment. When she finally registered her surroundings, however, she gasped loudly.

“Woah,” was all Sakura could say as she surveyed her environment.

Wherever Tobi-sensei had transported them to, it was completely abnormal and otherworldly; the area was pitch-black, seemingly endless, and had an infinite number of strange, rectangular prisms, all of which varied in size. Looking down, she realized that they were, in fact, standing on one of those rectangular prisms themselves. 

“Where are we?” she inquired with child-like wonder.

Tobi-sensei took a moment to calm down from his laughing fit, before explaining, “We’re in another dimension, basically. It’s a space-time ninjutsu!”

Sakura’s jaw dropped, practically falling to the floor. “That’s amazing,” she murmured, awe-stricken. “Woah,” she repeated for good measure.

Tobi-sensei chuckled, before she felt his hand on her shoulder again. “We’re not quite there yet,” he told her, and Sakura quickly braced herself for another teleportation, squeezing her eyes tightly.

When she found the courage to look around, the nauseous sensation that had risen in her stomach disappearing, she found them in the middle of a forested area. Sakura raised a thin eyebrow—weren’t there supposed to be a lot of hot springs?

As if reading her mind, Tobi-sensei began to march onwards, explaining:

“We’re near the border of the Land of Fire right now, so we’re surrounded by trees. We’ll see more bodies of water as we get further north. When we near Yugakure—this land’s hidden village—the lakes and rivers will become hotter, appearing in the form of hot springs.”

Tobi-sensei proceeded to stop walking, reaching up a tree to casually pick some berries, thus pausing his lecture for a moment. He then continued:

“As we go further north, near the Land of Frost, however, the water will become colder. In fact, in its hidden village, Shimogakure, all bodies of water will be frozen over because of the temperature.”

Sakura blinked, before her face lit up with admiration. This man, Tobi-sensei, was really, really smart! It became clear to her in that moment that, despite his childish mannerisms, Tobi-sensei was not dumb in any sense of the word.

“Please—tell me more,” she requested hopefully. Sakura craved for the knowledge; she was a paper ninja at heart, after all.

He giggled, handing her the berries, and she ate them as he went on about the Land of Hot Water and Frost.

From what he told her, apparently, Yugakure was one of the richest shinobi hidden villages in the world. However, they didn’t use their ninja for typical missions. Instead, in an attempt to prevent unneeded conflict, the shinobi worked exclusively within their borders, completing odd jobs to preserve their tourism-based economy.

Shimogakure, on the other hand, faced a lot of internal distrust due to their blatantly corrupt damiyo. Furthermore, in juxtaposition to Yu, Shimo’s economy was extremely fragile and unstable, income disparities often causing riots and fueling disloyalty from its shinobi.

Sakura was amazed. By knowing all these complex details, it sounded as if Tobi-sensei had been in all these different lands for extensive periods of time, meaning he was definitely well-traveled.

For the next two hours, like a sponge in water, Sakura absorbed all the information about not only Yu and Shimo’s geography, but the villages’ histories, political states, international relations, well-known clans and common techniques.

Around 7:00 PM, the two passed their first hot spring.

Tobi-sensei stopped abruptly, causing Sakura to almost bump into him.

“Alright!” he exclaimed, pumping his pale fist in the air. “This is where we’ll make camp for the night, as well as begin our training!” he told her, overly-enthusiastic.

Sakura looked around, before nodding. She dropped her pack on the floor, took a sip from her water bottle, and glanced at Tobi-sensei for further instructions.

“Right,” Sensei murmured, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly. “I’m a little new to this teacher thing, you know?” he laughed. 

Tobi-sensei sat down. Sakura followed his lead.

“For the next few hours, I’m going to test your chakra control,” he told her.

He began to scramble around the floor for something.

“Aha!” he exclaimed, picking up a leaf. He handed it to her. “I suppose you know what the Leaf Concentration Practice technique is?”

Sakura nodded. “We learned it in the Academy. The practitioner places the leaf on their forehead and then directs their chakra to the leaf to test for and improve chakra control. The forehead is the easiest place to control chakra through, making this a beginners technique,” she recited mechanically.

“Exactly, my lovely-student-who-also-happens-to-be-a-walking-textbook—that is correct!” Sensei complimented teasingly.

Sakura didn’t know whether she should be proud or offended. Nonetheless, her left eye twitched.

She sighed dramatically, before placing the leaf on her forehead and going through the chakra control technique. After a solid five minutes of slight concentration, Sensei spoke again from besides her.

“Okay, that’s good!” he cheered, and she let the leaf fall on to her lap.

He moved to stand in front of her, nearing the hot spring.

“Now. What do you know about walking up on solid surfaces?”

Sakura blinked, before standing up. She proceeded to demonstrate walking up a nearby tree. “Is this okay?” she asked, hanging upside-down from a branch.

Sensei huffed. “Show-off,” he muttered under his breath, sulking openly.

The pink-haired girl couldn’t help but giggle at the unbelievable missing nin with the large personality. She began to walk down the tree, nearing the floor.

“Ah—I bet you can’t do this!” he cried suddenly, before placing a foot over the water in the hot spring.

Sakura’s eyes widened, and she opened her mouth to tell him to stop, because he was going to fall in—

Before she could say anything, however, the orange-masked man was suddenly _standing_ on the water.

She vaguely recalled that Zabuza and Kakashi-sensei had done the same thing all those weeks ago in Wave.

“This is water-walking,” he told her. “Now you try!”

Pause.

Sakura’s eyes bulged out their sockets.

“I can’t—I mean—I...”she stammered unconfidently.

“Now, now, Sakura-chan,” Sensei reprimanded. “You’ve got to become stronger,” he reminded her.

Sakura flinched at the firm tone, slumping her shoulders helplessly. She was used to being the teacher’s pet for the entirety of her career at the Academy, and being in the presence of a missing nin didn’t simply undo that type of extensive conditioning.

Taking a deep breath, she infused her feet with chakra and stepped over the water—

—only to fall in.

She squealed. The water was hotter than she was prepared for, and she animatedly jumped out, falling to the ground.

Sensei laughed without restraint at her misfortune.

“Sorry, I forgot to mention,” he wheezed, “You have to adjust the output of chakra constantly according to the water, Sakura-chan!”

That was when Inner made her first appearance in a long time.

 _‘Could have told us that earlier, you unparalleled jackass!’_ Inner sneered.

Sakura cringed. Apparently, her other personality was getting more creative with the insults as of late.

Grumbling, Sakura sighed and tried again. And again. And again. And _again_.

After multiple attempts, she finally got the adjustment of the output of chakra right, and she found herself standing on water.

Well. Shit.

She didn’t think she could _actually_ do it.

She felt like... a _god_!

Tobi-sensei squealed from the sidelines like a supportive mother. “Great job, Sakura-chan!” he cried, before enveloping her into a hug while he simultaneously lifted her into the air.

Sakura froze at the sudden contact, and then choked. “Can’t... breathe...” she gritted out.

Immediately, Sensei loosened his grip, and she gasped for air. “Oh, sorry, Sakura-chan! Sorry, sorry, sorry!” he apologized profusely.

Sakura laughed nervously as he placed her back on the water. “It’s okay,” she re-assured.

“I’m just so proud of my cute little student!” he told her, sniffling.

Sakura sweat-dropped. Was he actually crying? Or was this just him keeping up his carefree persona?

She was very unsure and very confused.

It was as if a light-bulb appeared above his head abruptly.

“Sakura-chan—I’ll be right back, with a surprise!” he told her, before being sucked into the void from earlier.

She stared at the space he stood in previously, dumbfounded at his sudden exit—

—and then within seconds he was back, holding a picnic basket in his hand.

“I brought some dango!” he exclaimed.

Her mouth formed an ‘O’ in surprise, before Sakura smiled genuinely for the first time in a long time, grin seeming to stretch for miles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ Thank you for all the reviews! They really inspire me to write a chapter faster, even though I'm always super nervous when I get a new one haha  
> ✿ I hope Tobi didn't come off as creepy lmao. One of the struggles of writing a male teacher as eccentric as Obito's persona and a female student is that it might come of as... strange, whereas if they were of the same gender it would be more... socially acceptable??? Haha idk all I know is that Tobi isn't a pERVERT! XD  
> ✿ I know I said that we'd see Hayate but oof the chapter got too long. I'm sorry I'm unreliable af eek-  
> ✿ Next up: Water Release, Taijutsu, Ninja Ways and Hayate (for real this time)!


	11. Nindō

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> THANK YOU: for all the comments in the last chapter, they made me so happy! Like, actually - I was so happy! And the detail in the reviews really gave me new ideas for the fic, as well as letting me engage in some really thought-provoking conversations.
> 
> Due to all the support, I wrote an extra-long chapter! Hope you enjoy! :)

full of clarity, she finally found her nindō, remaining focused, self-reliant, heart no longer in limbo.

♟

**Land of Hot Water, April 21**

It was past midnight.

A gentle breeze ruffled his overgrown hair as Obito stared at the night sky, his emotions spiking abruptly.

The feelings he suppressed would often resurface whenever he got glimpses of the Moon, for it would give him a sense of... clarity—the fair Moon, which orbited the insignificant, unjust Earth, shone so brilliantly that the stars around the satellite paled in comparison, nearly disappearing into the blackness of the surrounding sky.

It was a vision that reminded him that _he had to succeed._

No matter what, he had to succeed in completing his version of the Eye of The Moon plan.

The plan, in its most basic steps, was simple: collect the tailed beasts, become the jinchūriki of the Ten-Tails, and eventually cast the Infinite Tsukuyomi.

However, Obito knew it was more complex than that, involving him and Zetsu having to carefully manipulate Nagato, Madara, the Akatsuki, and all the other players involved in creating the perfect genjutsu world.

A genjutsu world would allow him to go back to better times, in which Rin was alive, and in which half his body hadn't been crushed by falling rocks, and in which he, a child, didn't have to deal with adult problems—

It would be a world in which the tragedies he experienced would not occur to anyone else, allowing true peace to finally transpire.

♟

"Tobi-sensei," Sakura called from the opposite side of the campfire, voice timid.

"Hm?"

"Can you tell me more stuff? Like, more... information?"

If the old Obito was alive, he would have sighed in exasperation.

As his student had devoured their dango earlier, Obito further educated his new apprentice on the intricacies of the shinobi system, material ranging from the core fundamentals of the ninja arts and strategic fighting, to alliances and treaties of different nations, to an overview of the history of the world since the Sage of Six Paths and onwards.

Sakura just kept on digesting the information like she was starving, curiosity obvious in her thirst for knowledge—

—it was as if she was deliberately trying to distract herself from dozing off.

"Sakura-chan," Obito sang.

"Yes?"

His voice suddenly lowered an octave. "Go to sleep," he commanded.

Silence.

Then, he continued to stare at the sky, arms crossed under his head, concentration unwavering as he peered through the right eye-hole of his mask.

An hour passed before he snapped out of it.

Obito sat up, a faint yawn reaching his mouth. Scratching his back, he proceeded to glance at Sakura. His lips twitched into an irritated frown when he saw that the girl, who was snuggled into a blanket she packed, was still wide awake.

She was gazing at the stars, face gleaming with adoration for the night sky.

The second she noticed _he_ noticed that she was awake, however, she squeezed her eyes shut like a child caught red-handed.

With a scoff, he took long strides towards her, and was soon looming over her.

"Sakura," Obito said, imitating Madara, the baritone of his voice reverberating throughout the air.

He saw her physically tense, arms going rigid as if her muscles would _pop_ right out of their vessel.

"Why won't you sleep?" he questioned, not bothering to disguise his annoyance.

She didn't reply for a moment, before seemingly gaining the courage to flutter her lashes open, green irises holding a panicked glint. "I have—I have—" Sakura stammered nervously, clearly alarmed by Obito's chilling aura.

The girl took a breath, as if to compose herself.

"I have nightmares, that's all..." she trailed off.

"You need to sleep. If you don't, your body will be in a weakened state, and then you'll be killed within moments."

(He was about to add, _"And then you would be of no use to me,"_ but he bit back the harsh statement. Coming off as insensitive would be... counterproductive, he decided.)

Obito sighed. "I'm going cast a sleep genjutsu on you now."

Sakura's face fell.

"Don't fight it," he warned, knowing that her genjutsu release skills were above average for her age. "Or else I'll physically knock you out."

The threat caused Sakura's eyes to grow as large as saucers. She opened her mouth to say something, but he activated his Sharingan, and the second their gazes met, she was out.

Not a moment later, Black Zetsu, who was attached to White Zetsu, ascended from the ground, standing a few meters behind his new student's unconscious body.

"Dokuzetsu. Jōzetsu," Obito greeted the black and white half respectively.

"Hey there," White Zetsu returned. "Nagato is... _summoning_ you, ehehe—"

"This is absurd, Obito," Black Zetsu hissed, voice deeper than his counterpart; apparently, the darker half of the parasitic being couldn't handle another moment of _not_ berating Obito. "This girl is nothing but a useless liability."

"Umm, that's a bit harsh, you know...?" the white side chimed in.

Said half of Madara's will then proceeded to glance at Sakura, before releasing a squeal.

"Aw! Your student reminds me of a less grumpy, non-nihilistic, youthful version of you, Obito! How nostalgic—"

"We will get rid of the weakling," Black Zetsu interjected suddenly, evidently preparing to dispose of her body by consuming her flesh.

Obito grit his teeth, before speaking. "Stop," he commanded forcefully, causing the merged duo to freeze.

Pause.

"I'll make her stronger. She _will_ be of use to the Moon-Plan," he emphasized, feeling the air grow thicker.

Pause.

"I'll get her to a level of strength where she can manipulate events from within Konoha. She holds a unique position, after all, being the Nine-Tails Jinchūriki and Uchiha Sasuke's teammate. I have big, big plans for her."

For a moment, no one said anything. Eventually, however, Black Zetsu spoke up, murmuring, "Very well." Discontent was evident in his voice.

Silence hung over the surrounding area, and Obito took it as an opportunity to fully re-establish his dominance. "Beckon Guruguru to monitor the girl for the rest of the night," he told the

white half, "and then we will go see Nagato."

♟

When Sakura woke up from her dreamless sleep, it was due to the sensation of foreign chakra in her system, disrupting her natural flow. However, she didn't react with hostility; instead, she took her time opening her eyes against the harsh rays of the sun, enjoying the cozy warmth of her blanket.

She hadn't felt so relaxed, so safe, since before Team 7 left for Wave. The constant migraine that Sakura didn't even realize she had all but disappeared from the temple of her head, and the weight on her shoulders was non-existent.

It was the first night in a month that she slept peacefully, and it was all thanks to Tobi-sensei—granted, his method of putting her under a sleep genjutsu was a little... unorthodox, but it worked, so Sakura wasn't complaining.

When the girl sat up, she was expecting to see Tobi-sensei, who she had automatically assumed had been the one to dispel the illusion. Instead, however, she was met with a completely white... _being,_ looming directly over her.

Sakura did the only thing she could think to do: she screamed, at the top of her lungs, creating distance between herself and that... that... _thing._

"Tobi-sensei...!" Sakura called, panicked, eyes shifting in every direction to find him. Where was he? Did he decide she was of no use to him? Did he abandon her? Would this monster-like-being kill her? Would she have to fight him? Where did she put her weapons pouch—

"Hello there," the thing greeted. "Tobi-sensei isn't here right now, so he left me to watch over you!"

Sakura blinked. And then she blinked some more as the being placed what looked like a lunch box on the ground in front of her.

"Fish with rice for breakfast. Eat up!"

Then he continued to stare at her as if it wasn't abnormal, creepily peering through a mask unsettlingly similar to Tobi-sensei's.

Inner completely freaked out. _'We're so screwed_! _I bet this thing killed Sensei and is just fattening us up to eat later!'_

That thought made Sakura want to curl up and cry for a few hours. Despite being at the edge of tears, she tried to keep a cool head and reached for the lunchbox, deciding she needed to buy time so she could at least attempt to think of an escape plan.

As she unpacked the food, however, a note fell out. Cautiously, she unfolded it, only to see handwriting similar to that of Tobi-sensei. It read:

_Sakura-chan,_

_Sorry for leaving unannounced, but I have to go settle some business. I'll be back by lunch time!_

_After you eat, I want you to learn some Water Release jutsu. My friend, Guruguru, will give you some scrolls to guide you. Good luck! I know you can do it!_

_—Tobi-sensei_

Sakura took some time to analyze the handwriting to the best of her abilities, recalling the lessons at the Academy, and decided that it was indeed Sensei who wrote the note. At that realization, her racing heart slowed down, and she wiped away the beads of sweat gathering on her forehead.

Still freaked out by this Guruguru person, however, Sakura didn't look up again, and quietly unpacked her food. It looked good, she decided as she held the chopsticks. She automatically murmured an, "Itadakimasu."

(Guruguru might be creepy, yes, but Sakura had decent manners!)

Halfway through her food, she decided she couldn't eat anymore, her stomach feeling completely full. This serving was oddly large, she thought; it was probably double what she ate at home for breakfast.

Sakura began to put the food down, and Guruguru spoke up.

"Ob—I mean, Tobi-sensei told me to make sure you finished the entire plate," Guruguru said.

She smiled warily, looking up. "Thank you, but I'm full," she explained politely.

"Ah, it isn't a choice," Guruguru told her almost smugly. "Of course, I understand that you are a teenage human female and might be dieting to appear desirable for a teenage human male you are interested in—"

Sakura's entire face suddenly spasmed. The nerve of this guy!

"—however, it is important for you to eat enough, especially since you are a teenage human going through puberty."

Sakura didn't know whether she should be offended at the shallow conclusions this _thing_ came up with about her personality, or depressed because she knew they were partially, if not wholly true.

Also, why was he talking about her maturing body?! Who did he think he was?!

The vein in Sakura's forehead was protruding as she tried to figure out how to respond. "You...you call me a 'human' as if you aren't human!" she growled, animatedly pointing an accusatory finger at Guruguru, face flushing with annoyance and embarrassment.

Guruguru giggled bizarrely. "That's because I'm not a human!" he exclaimed.

Sakura's jaw nearly dropped to the ground.

"I'm an artificial being, so I don't eat!"

Her eyes were about to pop out of her skull, and she subtly pinched herself to make sure she wasn't imagining the entire conversation.

"We don't eat food, and we don't need a toilet, meaning we don't even crap!" Guruguru listed boastfully. "And unlike you, my body has _real_ feelings that lets me enjoy humour! I mean, yeesh, you got offended really quickly at that diet joke!"

Sakura tried to process all the information she was being told.

How, or rather, _why_ did Tobi-sensei have an _artificial being_ as an underling?

She had a lot of questions she wasn't certain she wanted the answers to.

Guruguru sighed pathetically, snapping her out of her thoughts. "Although my vocabulary may be more advanced than a regular human, unfortunately, I cannot crap," he said, looking far into the distance almost sadly.

She blinked, not knowing how to respond.

"Say, Sakura..." Guruguru started obtrusively. "The excretory impulse—that is, wanting to crap... what does it feel like?"

Pause.

Sakura's temper was instantaneously triggered, previous caution forgotten.

"Who do you think you are, you shameless bastard?!" she cried, throwing her lunchbox at him, which was an attack he dodged by comically stepping to the side. "I am a lady! Show some respect!"

Chest heaving, she took a deep breath in, and let it out, trying to compose herself as she counted to ten. She then stubbornly crossed her arms over her chest and fell to the ground, puffing her cheeks.

Pause.

Guruguru broke out into hysterical laughter.

"What's so funny?!" Sakura raged again, standing up.

"Nothing, nothing," he insisted, but she didn't buy his assurances for a second.

Sakura clenched her fist:. This Guruguru person was ten times more infuriating than Naruto ever could be, even when he was having ramen withdrawal symptoms! There was no way she could survive being around him without killing him!

(Or killing herself.)

♟

Later, after Sakura calmed down, Guruguru gleefully handed her a storage scroll and asked her to unseal it, which she did warily. Sakura searched its contents, which was mainly material on Water Release, something she immediately began to study intently.

One of the introductory texts read:

_"Water Release is one of the five basic elemental transformations, most commonly found in shinobi of Kirigakure._

_Water Release, as the name implies, is the manipulation of water as an offensive or defensive technique. Water is the most versatile element, allowing users to solidify the liquid to a certain extent._

_Users of Water Release thrive in settings with pre-existing water..."_

Sakura recalled Zabuza and Kakashi-sensei's fight; the rogue ninja was capable of creating immense, terrifying dragons and practically inescapable prisons that proved to be nearly immobilizing, so long as he had a source of the element. 

She was slowly realizing that learning, and potentially mastering, this nature transformation had the possibility of making her strong enough to defend herself against people like Koyo, who wanted to use her.

With that in mind, she deliberately ignored Guruguru (who was muttering to himself) and continued to read:

_"Over time, users can learn to utilise water from within the body to expel from the mouth. However, if not done carefully, this can harm the body internally due to the force of the jutsu._

_Furthermore, there are some shinobi who possess enough control and chakra in their reserves to convert their energy to water, a notable example being the Nidaime Hokage, Senju Tobirama. But, this is extremely rare._

_Water is strong against fire, but weak against earth. Additionally, Water Release can increase the flow of Lightning Release and Wind Release can increase the power of water techniques..."_

Sakura stopped reading the scroll. As interesting as the review of nature-based jutsu was, she had approximately three hours to practice this elemental transformation in order to have something to show Tobi-sensei.

Shuffling through all the scrolls, she found one labeled 'D-rank' and opened it, deciding to start from the very beginning.

The first jutsu the scroll discussed was the Hidden Mist Jutsu—the same one Zabuza used only a month ago to prevent Kakashi-sensei from seeing his attack. Sakura swallowed; this was only a D-rank jutsu, and yet it had already proven to be extremely useful.

Standing up, the girl made her way to the hot spring nearby, and began to make the hand signs listed in the scroll.

"Ox, snake, ram..." she whispered.

♟

Two hours passed, and Sakura wasn't even able to move the water, let alone master this supposedly simple technique. Her already tiny chakra reserves were halfway depleted, and everytime she failed to do the jutsu, Guruguru would chime in to offer his services.

("Do you need help?" he would question bouncily.

"No," Sakura would grit out stubbornly, because she wouldn't ask such a _vexing_ individual for aid!

...And then the cycle would continue.)

Eventually, Guruguru walked up to her. Unexpectedly, however, his back straightened as he saluted her, a gesture that caused Sakura's mouth to open and close with surprise.

"I'm sorry for talking about crap!" he apologized hurriedly.

Sakura's face softened. She began to feel a little guilty about her slight... _overreaction_ , from earlier. "It's okay," she murmured, eyes shifting uncomfortably.

She glanced at the hot spring, and swallowed her pride.

"Can you please help me with this jutsu? No matter what I try, I don't know how to make it work..." she requested timidly.

Guruguru rhythmically tapped his patterned cheek while assuming a playful thinking pose.

After a moment, he appeared to have had a revelation.

"Ah-ha!" he exclaimed. "The issue is not that you aren't doing the jutsu and signs correctly, but rather that you aren't focusing your chakra on the individual water molecules with the intention of changing its shape. For example, if you want to turn the water into gas, make the molecules move further apart. If you want to make the water solid, however, bring the molecules closer together !"

Sakura's eyes widened. That made perfect sense—jutsu was really just chakra mixing with science, after all!

Nodding gratefully, she faced the hot spring, made a guiding hand seal, and sent out her chakra to feel the already-present gas around the body of water. Just as Guruguru predicted, the individual particles were further apart and constantly moving.

With this realization, she did the hand signs to the Hidden Mist Jutsu once more.

"Ox, snake, ram," Sakura chanted. She proceeded to focus her chakra on the single particles in the liquid and mimicked the example she felt out earlier.

The jutsu was successful, and the area was suddenly overflowing with mist.

Sakura squealed with excitement. Guruguru gave her a thumbs up, and she grinned widely.

Within the next hour, Sakura was able to master two more supplementary D-ranked techniques, which came naturally with the theory. Furthermore, she began to study the basis for the Water Prison Jutsu, and was fairly confident that she could learn it.

Out of nowhere, suddenly, Tobi-sensei appeared to her right by expelling his body from the hole in his mask. Sakura flinched, startled, before recognition lit her eyes and she smiled.

"Sensei!" she greeted, oddly excited. "I did it! I learned Water Release!"

She felt proud; all her hard work and dedication paid off!

(After all, Sakura didn't initially think she could do it, but she proved herself wrong. A wave of confidence took motion within.)

"Great job, Sakura-chan! I knew you could do it!"

The man in the orange mask ruffled her hair, and for a moment, she allowed herself to believe that he was Kakashi-sensei.

♟

Immediately after, Tobi-sensei quickly informed her that they would make their way to Yugakure right then and there, and she didn't protest despite feeling tired.

Soon, the trio were traveling by foot through the Land of Hot Water, and five minutes in, Sakura was already exhausted, sweat gathering on her forehead.

The speed was breakneck, and she could barely keep up as they jumped through the trees. Her breathing was unsteady, and she simply didn't have the stamina to match the consistent pace Sensei set.

It was a fact that made her feel so _weak_. 

Tobi-sensei probably noted her failings, for he halted abruptly, causing Sakura to nearly bump into him.

"Sakura-chan," he sighed, mildly exasperated. "For now, I'm going to let you wear Guruguru. He'll take some of the strain off."

She furrowed her eyebrows. What did he mean by "wear Guruguru"...?

Suddenly, she felt a gust of wind hit her from behind. Sakura glanced at the source, and to her horror, porcelain limbs that could only belong to Guruguru were surrounding her.

They were like branches, slowly creeping underneath her cloak to trap her in their hold, and the sensation of the entity's unwanted touch was so cold, bitter and uncomfortable, and she felt like her heart would explode, the fear overwhelming her senses, leaving her terrified and paralyzed—

"Sensei..." Sakura whispered, trying to show with her eyes that she wasn't ready to be touched like this! She wasn't ready, she wasn't ready, she wasn't ready—

"Calm down," Sensei commanded, voice harsh. "If you react like this to every traumatic experience you have in this world, you'll die. You're a kunoichi, so don't act like such a nuisance," he spat, and her world froze at the term, 'nuisance'.

_(Nuisance; worthless, burden, useless—)_

Sakura swallowed thickly, before clenching her quivering hands into fists, taking in a deep breath, and trying to remain calm as Guruguru's cold touch extended across her arms, legs, chest, pelvis—

Reflexively, a choking sound left her mouth, which was immediately muffled as the white limbs wrapped around her face.

Sakura tried to move.

She tried to do anything, but she couldn't find it within herself to even twitch a finger, let alone take a step.

Suddenly, she depersonalized involuntarily. She watched her vessel, with the help of Guruguru, begin to jump through the trees once again, and she couldn't recognize her own movements.

♟

It was well into the afternoon.

Obito and Sakura were nearing Yugakure. His student hadn't said a word the entire time, responding to any conversation he initiated with curt nods and short gestures, as if she wasn't present in the moment.

He didn't particularly care about her feelings, though; "wearing" Guruguru was a necessary step, one which would lead her to recognize that he, her mentor, knew best.

Sakura would soon understand that she needed Guruguru for multiple reasons: firstly, she needed a disguise, so in the (highly-unlikely) case Obito would slip up and be spotted by onlookers, said witnesses wouldn't learn the identity of the easily-distinguishable pink-haired girl that was traveling with him.

Obito didn't do "loose ends", after all.

Secondly, Guruguru's aid would not only steadily increase her stamina and speed, but also teach her how to work in the shadows.

Logically, she would note the subtle ways Guruguru and Obito moved, learning how to easily slip past any potential spectators, travel through blind spots expertly, and leave nothing behind to indicate her presence.

Finally, confronting her traumas would toughen her up.

He believed that the longer she displayed the fear of being touched, the harder it would be to break the habit. After all, how could a ninja—even the genjutsu type—afford to be afraid of being touched? Even the idea was sheer absurdity.

As the trio neared the village, their initial destination, Obito stopped abruptly. He turned around, giving a thumbs up to his cute little student. "Okay, Sakura-chan! Before we enter Yu, I want to test your skills in genjutsu and taijutsu!" he told her.

Guruguru promptly separated himself from her, and she inhaled deeply, sucking in oxygen as if she had been deprived. Her hand reached to touch the pulse point on her neck, and moments later, ease reached her face.

She rested on the ground, the moonlight shining across her eyes.

(She easily displayed a tranquility Rin's features hadn't been able to capture as she died unjustly on the 10th of October, twelve years ago.

It annoyed him, how dissimilar she was to Rin.)

♟

Obito tested Sakura's abilities after that.

First, he put her under a couple of illusions. As predicted, she easily broke out of D-rank and C-rank jutsus, but struggled with anything above a B-rank. Nonetheless, if nurtured, he was certain Sakura could soon gain a high level of immunity to genjutsu.

On the other hand, he discovered that she struggled with casting illusions.

This, however, would improve with practice. Furthermore, it would strengthen his student's utilization of Yin release, a nature transformation also necessary for medical ninjutsu.

(Genjutsu and medical ninjutsu; if these two skills were honed, and then combined with the Kekkei Genkai Obito would... _borrow_ , Sakura would stand a chance in becoming exceptionally powerful.

Or perhaps he was being uncharacteristically overly-optimistic, weakened by his own growing attachment to the girl, who was proving to not be enough like Rin.)

After, they moved onto testing her ability with weaponry. She was, at best, satisfactory in that area. But, the skill could be improved through training, he decided.

Then they reached hand-to-hand combat.

He knew her taijutsu was subpar, but he hadn't anticipated that she was _that_ weak in that subject.

Her form was terrible.

There was no fluidity in her movements.

She failed at getting close to landing a single hit.

She couldn't block or dodge any of his attacks.

His annoyance was reaching a boiling point. She was miles behind Rin's abilities, and Rin died because even she wasn't able to dodge Kakashi's Chidori—

Obito cocked his head to the side, peering at her through his mask. "Do you wish to die?" he questioned, voice deep.

There was a moment of silence, before she stammered, "W-what?"

♟

"Do you wish to die?" Tobi-sensei repeated.

Sakura's eyes widened, before she shook her head repeatedly.

Of course she wanted to live!

"N-no—"

"If you do wish to die, I won't stop you," he remarked. "Your abilities are inadequate. At this point, it is destined that you will die soon."

There was a pause, and her heart was sinking in her chest, progressively getting heavier as she waited for Tobi-sensei to continue to voice the harsh truth.

"Your weakness will kill you, therefore, you are killing yourself because you are weak."

Sakura's eyes shifted to the side, and then a fat tear rolled down her cheek. She blinked, but they didn't stop coming, so she bit her lip, trying to supress the sobs.

Then, out of nowhere, Tobi-sensei reached to wipe away the tears he caused.

That did it. Sakura started flat-out bawling, falling to her knees pathetically because it was _so painful._ Everything hurt, and she didn't even know who she was crying for; her mother, her father, herself.

All of the above, perhaps.

Sensei's arms wrapped around her, and she curled into him, in the fetal position.

When the tears finally stopped coming, Sakura was raw and exhausted, eyelids hot and shoulders sore from quaking for so long. But she felt lighter, and cleaner, too, like she finally expelled something from her body that was making her sick.

She fell asleep after that, and Tobi-sensei held her as she did.

(Despite how cold his arm was, she felt warm all over.)

♟

**Yu, April 22**

The next morning, at the crack of dawn, when Sakura awoke, she found herself in a hotel room.

She didn't panic this time; instead, she subconsciously found herself trusting Tobi-sensei, and searched for the note he left (because he always left a note, she realized).

In said note, Sensei cheerily explained to her that he dropped her off in Yugakure, and that he had to go do something. Therefore, she was free for the day, and could do whatever she wanted. He even left money for her.

Sakura didn't have the energy, feeling too tired to think too deeply about her new mentor's mood swings—about how he built her up, just to tear her down, just to build her up again.

So, instead she decided she would take a quick rinse and leave for the hot springs. She felt sore from the attacks Tobi-sensei landed on her during their spar (if it could even be called that; it was more like her being his practice dummy, and taking all the hits while none of hers landed). 

Yugakure was simply beautiful. It was nothing like Konoha, or Wave; the steam was warm and relaxing, the sky was a breathtaking hue of orange, and the people were welcoming to tourists, greeting her with bright smiles. It allowed a certain sense of calmness to envelope her, and she could ignore the pain that had been gripping her like a vice for the past week.

Sakura found herself in front of a hot spring. The sign intrigued her, as it claimed that the water had special healing properties. She vaguely recalled Tobi-sensei telling her that the liquid in the nation had medicinal qualities determined by different minerals.

Perhaps the hot spring could heal her bruised body...?

Making the affirmative decision, Sakura prepared to have a nice, long soak.

♟

Uzumaki Karin was in Yugakure, with her team that consisted of herself and two older jounin she barely knew.

Kusagakure had assigned her senior counterparts a mission, and as per always, she was to provide support in the event that they were injured through the use of her healing capabilities. The mission was diplomatic in nature, however it involved Kirigakure, which was always dubious, and thus she was 'required'.

On their way back to Kusa, the team-leader decided to stop by Yu for a day, and that's how she found herself entering that specific hot spring.

She wanted to test out the supposed medicinal qualities of the water, hoping they could heal the bite marks that scarred her body. She purposefully came in the early morning, wanting to be alone, so no one could see the marks that stained her and made her so self-conscious—

And then a girl with short hair and green eyes around her age had the audacity to come inside and ruin her plans.

Their gazes met briefly, before both looked away awkwardly. The other girl dropped her towel and got under the water, and Karin promptly began to debate getting out.

Karin then felt a persistent gaze on her shoulders from behind her, causing her to tense.

The silence only lasted a moment.

"Excuse me..." the unknown girl spoke shyly. "Are you... Are you okay?" she asked vaguely.

Karin scoffed. "I'm fine," she gritted out, preparing to take her leave.

The nosy girl didn't know her limits, it seemed. "But..." she started unsurely. "Your wounds—"

"Mind your own damn business," Karin hissed abruptly, cutting the unknown girl off.

Pause.

The redhead began to wrap her towel around herself.

Then the green-eyed girl spoke again. "I'm sorry. I should have kept out of it," she said earnestly, and that sincerity only annoyed Karin more.

The redhead glanced behind her, eyebrows scrunching as she adjusted her glasses.

Her annoyance was reaching a climax. Karin could tell the other female was a kunoichi like her, based on her chakra signature, so she should know better than to go prodding in things that didn't concern her!

Who did this girl think she was?!

Karin didn't know what drove her to continue, but she snarled:

"These scars; I have them because no one cares enough to respect me and my body. I've been used as a tool for so long. It's something _you_ would never understand."

And then she left.

(Little did Karin know, her words were left ringing in the mind of the green-eyed girl, who experienced a moment of clarity thanks to her.)

♟

It was nearing midnight. Sakura was seated at the foot of the bed, legs crossed as she meditated in silence, when Tobi-sensei teleported into the hotel room.

"Yo!" he greeted cheerily.

He then tossed a bag in her direction. It was filled to the brink with scrolls and books.

"I found you some resources!" Sensei began to explain. "Most of them are water techniques from Kirigakure. I also packed some scrolls detailing the Uchiha taijutsu style for you to learn. _And_ I managed to pull a few strings and get access to some personal texts of the Nidaime Mizukage, H _ō_ zuki Gengetsu—naturally, the genjutsu listed are extremely powerful!"

Her mouth created an 'O' shape, brain forming panicked thoughts in continuous waves. Just who was the man behind the burnt, orange mask, and how did he get access to such high-ranking texts?

What had Sakura gotten herself into?

Tobi-sensei's bouncing was replaced by a no-nonsense step forward. "It goes without saying that no one can know what these scrolls contain, and how you got them, hm?" he added.

Sakura nodded, smiling fakely. "Of course, Sensei," she affirmed, heart racing.

The bounce in her mentor's step returned. "Great!" he sang. "Now, I'll drop you back at your village; self-study, remain diligent and hone these skills," he commanded, before placing a hand on her shoulder.

"Of course."

They were both sucked into the eye-hole of his mask.

♟

**Konoha, April 22**

A large group of shinobi, including Hayate, were gathered at a bar, celebrating Chōza-san's 38th birthday.

It wasn't often that so many of his comrades were in the village at the same time, and despite not typically enjoying social gatherings, Hayate forced himself to attend. After all, the life of the shinobi was uncertain.

Although he was almost sure he wouldn't die so soon, who knew if he'd ever get such an opportunity again?

Everybody was drunk, including himself, who was slightly tipsy. Hayate found it interesting, how easily shinobi let down their walls when drunk.

Ibiki was animatedly discussing his latest 'success' in T&I, confidentiality be damned; Anko was boldly flirting with the bartender, who's face went pale when she mentioned something about their 'blood mixing'; Shikaku-san was receiving a painful slap from his wife, Yoshino-san, after he called her a 'troublesome woman'.

Hayate's lover, Yūgao, was looking stunning in a white dress, sitting between himself and Hatake Kakashi, trying to cheer the latter up by engaging in meaningless small-talk.

Kakashi—Hayate hadn't seen him appear so passive, indifferent and apathetic since the man left ANBU all those years ago.

He knew it was because of what happened to his student.

(Everybody knew the cause.

The whispers that were surrounding the duo were merciless, re-opening the shameless gossip about the 'traitorous' White Fang, and how history was repeating itself with Kakashi's student.)

"Senpai..." Yūgao murmured, addressing Kakashi as he stood up quietly to take his leave.

An awkward silence rang in the room, before Might Guy went after him, leaving whispers in his wake. Yūgao met Hayate's eyes briefly, before looking away sadly, continuing to sip at her drink.

He grabbed her hand reassuringly. She pulled away. "You have a mission tomorrow morning, don't you?" she asked quietly. "I think you should sleep off the alcohol."

Hayate's lips quirked downwards slightly, before he nodded. "Yeah," he replied, before smiling tightly, and getting up to exit.

As he left the bar, he glanced at the sky, lighting a cigarette as he watched the full moon. It was absolutely breathtaking, he thought, being the only source of light in the area, aside from the few lampposts nearby.

Wanting to see the sight for a little longer, he decided to take the lengthier way home.

On the way to his house, however, he passed the park, where he witnessed a shadow from the corner of his eye.

Glancing past the wired fence, Hayate saw a figure sitting on the swing in the park, staring at the same moon he had been watching, too.

It was the girl from the library, and Kakashi's student, Haruno Sakura.

She was wearing an oversized black cloak, swinging back and forth as she gazed at the sky intently.

Hayate didn't know what compelled him to do it. Perhaps it was the alcohol, or the want to ease Kakashi's struggles, so Yūgao wouldn't be so... disturbed because of it.

Either way, he soon found himself entering the park, approaching the girl slowly. "Hello," he greeted calmly, getting rid of his cigarette simultaneously.

Sakura looked at him from her peripheral vision, before vague recognition reached her face. "Hello," she returned quietly, before numbly watching the sky again.

"May I sit here?" Hayate asked, pointing to the swing next to hers.

She shrugged.

♟

Sakura saw Hayate sit down on the swing besides her, before he glanced at the moon. "It's beautiful, isn't it?" he questioned, referring to the pale satellite.

"Yeah... It is."

Sakura felt too numb to really care, and Hayate pursed his lips. "You know..." he began gently, "They say that, in the moon, a dead goddess rests. They also say that it's where we all go when we die; to rest with the mother of all beings, in the Pure Land."

The words came out before she could stop herself. "That's bullshit," she spat, before covering her mouth.

Pause.

"Sorry..." she apologized quietly.

Hayate chuckled, causing her to feel slightly reassured. "That's fine," he told her. "It's just an old wives' tale, anyway."

Pause.

"May I be frank?" he asked softly.

Sakura didn't know how to respond, so she didn't say anything at all. He perceived the lack of objection as a 'yes', it seemed.

"What happened with your father... it wasn't your fault."

Sakura promptly snapped her neck in his direction. "It was," she insisted.

Who did this guy think he was, to tell her it wasn't her fault, when she knew very well that her inadequacy in Wave is what initiated the chain reaction?

She swallowed thickly, eyes closing. "I killed him," she breathed. "It was me. I killed him—"

"The decision your father made was his own," Hayate interjected, eyes sharp.

Pause.

"People call me an indivualist, but... it's important, to know that everybody has their own free will—"

Sakura scoffed, clutching the bag with the scrolls in her hand. "If free will was a thing, people wouldn't be used by other people!"

She thought back to what that red-haired girl said, back in Yu: _"These scars; I have them because no one cares enough to respect me and my body. I've been used as a tool for so long. It's something you would never understand."_

The thing was Sakura did understand. "If free will was a thing, people wouldn't be used and manipulated. If _I_ wasn't used and manipulated, Papa—"

She cut herself off abruptly. She was revealing too much.

Pause.

"It is true that free will is limited," Hayate started heavily. "But despite how limited it is, it's still there."

Hayate smiled sadly, and tears fell down her face.

"None of this is my place, but you have to carry on. I truly believe that you need to focus on _your_ health, and find _your_ purpose," he explained. "Do you have a nindō? Perhaps having a goal could make things easier? Help you find purpose?"

_A nindō..._

The reason for being a ninja. Sakura had pondered about her purpose extensively, before her father took his life.

She just _was_ a shinobi, and in the Academy, her only goal was passing and being in the same team as Sasuke-kun.

Then her goal had been forced to change after the _incident_ in Wave. She just wanted to be strong enough to defend herself, so no one could hurt her again.

And then, right in front of her eyes, her goal was evolving once more, and she could practically hear her new nindō echoing in her ears:

Sakura _will_ become strong enough, in order to have the power to make sure no one around her would ever be used as a tool again.

That was her ninja way. That was her purpose, and if she didn't fulfill it—well, Sakura would rather die.

She let go of a sob. She was finally free, finally _released_.

Now, she had to remain diligent. Stay focused. Get stronger.

Sakura glanced at Hayate—a tokubetsu jounin, meaning he was strong.

She didn't know what drove her to do it, but she bowed and exclaimed, "Please train me!"

There was silence, and she looked up, seeing that Hayate was positively dumbfounded. "Pardon?" he murmured.

"Please train me!" she repeated once more.

Pause.

Hayate sighed teasingly.

"I supposed I can't say no to such a request," he remarked. "Very well—but know, I believe in independence, self-study and self-reliance, so it'll be tough."

"That's fine, I can take it," Sakura grinned. "Thank you."

And a new chapter in her life began. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ I really can't tell if this chapter is trashy or good lmao oh well I tried. But god Obito is so difficult to write!  
> ✿ How did you guys feel of Hayate finally getting his moment? It had a lot of build-up, but it was done because he will affect Sakura a lot emotionally, morally, etc, and although he's more lowkey than other characters, I found the fact that he's described as an individualist to be very interesting. I'm kind of salty because I feel like Kishi built such a good foundation for a Hayate and Yūgao's story, and honestly it should have been an aftermath arc - instead it was just kind of forgotten, until that one filler in the war-arc :(  
> ✿ After this chapter, time will pass faster until the month of July (in the story). So, hopefully it won't feel so dragged out, since my base for the future has finally been solidified.  
> ✿Thank you for all the kudos, you kind comments, and bookmark notes! :)


	12. Masks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Abuse of the word 'Sensei' occurs.... You have been warned. 
> 
> Haha, anyways, this next chapter is essentially a super long one-month training montage, with mind games mixed in. I hope you enjoy. 
> 
> Also, shameless self-promotion... 
> 
> NEWS: I've started a **prequel** that is Team Minato-centric. It's a short, canon-compliant story that essentially details the timeline before Rin died, and before Sakura met Obito. You don't have to read it, but if you really want to better understand the motivations of Obito and really feel the history, click on it below!
> 
> Link: [create something beautiful (only to destroy it)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18336806/chapters/43409138)

he had seen this before, the renegade realized:  
wounded children, pushing each other off cliffs.

♟

**Konoha, April 23**

It was sunrise, and Sakura woke up in her room; she had snuck into her own house during the night, taking care to walk without sound like Tobi-sensei did, in the true manner of the ninja.

Sakura found herself staring at the ceiling she had seen every morning since she was old enough to sleep without her parents. For a moment, she allowed herself to believe that nothing had changed.

But that wasn’t true.

Everything had changed.

Almost nothing was the same… _she_ wasn’t the same, for the girl staring back at her in her body-length mirror wasn’t the version of Sakura she thought Ino had helped her create; the version she had gotten so used to.

The girl staring back had harder eyes, whereas the Sakura she knew was innocent. She was softer and younger and _happier—_

She couldn’t take it. She hated that she couldn’t recognize herself _—_

No. She hated herself, she realized suddenly.

So in an effort to avoid the inevitable self-loathing of the person she had been and the person she was becoming, she covered the mirrors. Every single mirror in her room and her bathroom would remain hidden behind white sheets, and she would actively avoid any other reflective surfaces from then on.

Papa said mirrors made things appear bigger. She didn’t need her identity crisis to be bigger than it already was.

Besides, Sakura no longer needed to see her reflection, she reasoned, because she didn’t have time to worry about her looks anymore. Instead, she would focus unwaveringly on her recently-discovered goal: she _will_ become strong enough, in order to have the power to make sure no one around her would be used as a tool again.

(Sakura had been _enlightened_. She now had a nindō, which gave her purpose, and in order to realize her dream, she would train in the art of the ninja tirelessly. Everything else in her life would become a lesser priority until she reached her goal.

Although Sakura wished she could go to a dimension in which she was more innocent, because in this dimension, she had lost so much; but losing her innocence had led to her enlightenment, so at the same time, she had gained so much.)

♟

When Sakura went to grab breakfast, she saw her mother moving boxes twice her size out of the house.

Mama turned to glance at her, before a broad smile reached her mouth and relief flooded her face. The blonde woman dropped the box she was carrying, and ran to embrace her daughter. “Sakura!” she exclaimed, voice strained. “You made me so worried… idiot…!”

Sakura’s lips quivered, and she didn’t know what to say.

Once again, she had caused Mama so much pain.

“I’m sorry…” Sakura released weakly, emotions threatening to leave her eyes as she hugged her mother back, perhaps with more strength than necessary. “Tadaima...”

Eventually, her mother let her go, wiping away her own stray tears. “Okaeri,” she replied finally.

The older woman then turned around to pick up the box, the abruptness catching Sakura off-guard.

“Sweetheart, I’m selling your father’s things _—_ ”

Sakura froze. _What…? So quickly…? But he_ just _died…!_

” _—_ I mean, we need the money, and I can’t bring myself to look at his stuff...”

Pause.

Sakura swallowed, before nodding, not-really-there.

She wouldn’t object to it; after all, she was the one who essentially killed Mama’s husband, so she had no right to give her opinion.

Her mother looked at Sakura meditatively. “Do…” Mama started. “Do you want to… I don’t know… take some stuff from the boxes? Some things you want to keep?”

The girl shrugged helplessly, before making her way to the packages parked outside the house.

She felt sick. The last thing Sakura wanted to do was pick through her dead father’s possessions, in front of her grieving mother, when she was the one responsible for his suicide.

But she did it anyways.

In the end, she took all of his weapons and some mesh armour she never saw him wear. She figured she could cut up the armour to fit her and put it on under her clothes, just like how she adjusted his cloak to size.

Yeah. No need to let perfectly good tools go to waste, after all.

♟

**Konoha, April 26**

Three days passed, and Sakura diligently and tirelessly studied the scrolls Tobi-sensei gave her.

After some contemplation, however, she finally gained the courage to go to Team 7’s meeting place. She’d have to face them eventually, anyways.

That morning, the pink-haired girl carefully prepared three dishes with the help of her mother: miso soup with eggplant, miso ramen with extra pork, and omusubi with okaka and tomatoes. The food was for Kakashi-sensei, Naruto and Sasuke-kun respectively.

Sakura felt shame. She recognized that her reaction when she found out about Papa was uncalled for _—_ she had hurt her team, with her throwing of bowls, swearing, and untrue declarations of hatred.

But Sakura wasn’t good at apologizing for her… compulsive nature, so she hoped the food she prepared would convey how sincerely sorry she was.

When she reached the red bridge, as per always, Sasuke-kun was there first, leaning against the pole.

Their eyes met, and an awkward silence ensued, with him looking at her almost analytically, and her looking away guiltily.

“Good morning, Sasuke-kun,” Sakura offered.

He made a sound of acknowledgement similar to a hum.

“I made breakfast. For you. And the others, of course.”

Sakura cautiously handed the food to him, deliberately looking away and missing her crush’s slightly arched eyebrow, before standing further from him than usual, reviewing her notes on genjutsu silently.

(It almost physically hurt, distancing herself from Sasuke-kun like that, because she wanted him to be with her. She wanted him so much _—_

But since she had been _enlightened_ , she had come to the realization that love would have to wait, for her existence was larger than pursuing a relationship now that she had a purpose larger than life itself.

No, she hadn’t given up on being with Sasuke-kun; she had simply put an indefinite hiatus on that goal in pursuit of another.)

♟

Ten minutes later, Naruto showed up.

The first thing the idiot did was grin stupidly.

“Sakura-chan!” he exclaimed, speeding towards her. “You came back!”

Sakura’s lips quirked upwards. “Good morning,” she greeted pleasantly. “I made you breakfast!”

Naruto blinked, before his mouth turned into an impossibly large smile that almost filled his entire face. “ _Home cooked_ _ramen_?!” he questioned loudly. “No one’s ever made me home cooked food _—_ thanks a whole, whole lot, Sakura-chan, dattebayo!”

Immediately, Sakura’s own smile faltered at the knowledge that no one had ever fed Naruto a homemade meal, and something in her heart felt sore.

She went back to reviewing her notes.

“Don’t mention it.”

♟

Kakashi-sensei, in typical Kakashi-sensei fashion, came three hours late.

“You’re late, Sensei!” Naruto exclaimed.

“Sorry, sorry. I was almost on time, I swear, but then Kurenai-sensei stopped me and guilt-tripped me into helping her decide which lipstick shade matched the best with her outfit. My dear friend, Asuma-sensei, finally asked her out on a date, you see, so it was very, very important that I help her out with her indecisiveness. I might have some godchildren soon.”

Naruto processed the statement for a second, before glaring at Team 7’s leader. “That’s such a dumb excuse ‘ttebayo!” he yelled, eyes protruding.

The older man sighed with fake exasperation. And then he finally focused on Sakura with his uncovered, lone eye, pupil piercing into her being as if he could see _everything_.

Sakura pursed her lips nervously, but relaxed immediately when she saw the outline of a faint, comforting smile under her mentor’s mask.

“Sensei!” she suddenly scolded jokingly, holding up the meal she prepared for him, trying to keep the mood light. “I made you miso soup with eggplant, but since you’re _late_ , it’s all cold now!” she pouted. 

“Maa, I bet it’s still delicious,” he told her, waving a hand dismissively, before his tone became more sincere. “Thank you.”

Sakura grinned happily.

“Now, our first mission of the day is to… find Tora!”

Naruto groaned and complained. Sasuke-kun scoffed, but moved to do the job anyways. Sakura, on the other hand, nodded attentively, which she knew was uncharacteristic.

She had decided that she would do her best on the D-rank missions Team 7 was assigned from then on. Be it breaking up fights between drunks or painting fences, Sakura would complete them efficiently and effectively.

That way, she would climb up the ninja ranks, and gain the power she needed to make her goal come true.

♟

**Konoha, April 28**

Two days later, Hayate sought out Sakura.

He found her holed up in the library, reading a text about the Nidaime Mizukage. He blinked as he quietly peeked over her shoulder; that was certainly an interesting choice of material to study.

“Hey,” Hayate greeted, muffling a cough.

She turned around calmly, evidently having sensed his presence. “Hello,” Sakura returned, smiling politely.

“So…” Hayate began, “...I’m prepared to start your training _—_ whenever you’re ready, of course. Just let me know.”

Eagerness suddenly filled her eyes. “Whenever…?” Sakura repeated.

Hayate nodded.

“Can we start now?” she exclaimed suddenly, a little too loudly for a library.

She then blushed beet red once an older woman shushed her from across the building angrily.

“Sorry…” Sakura murmured.

Hayate smiled warmly.

He bet that her cuter tendencies could even break Yūgao’s harsh exterior, who was a toughened ANBU operative respected highly by the Hokage himself. She also happened to be his girlfriend.

“It’s perfectly fine,” Hayate said. “Well _—_ shall we get going?”

“Yes please, Sensei!”

♟

They were at the training grounds, and Sakura watched Hayate-sensei pull out a scroll. She leaned forward in anticipation, waiting for the totally-super-cool-techniques he was about to show her.

Five swords popped out.

Sakura blinked.

“A sword?” she deadpanned, dumbfounded.

She proceeded to panic.

How was a _sword_ supposed to help her against a powerful enemy with powerful ninjutsu, like Zabuza? And what was she thinking, asking a jounin to mentor her when she knew nothing about his specified skill-set?

She had been so naive, making the impulsive decision to ask him to train her _—_

Hayate-sensei smiled lightly, as if he knew what she was thinking. “Don’t worry,” he told her. “I can assure you, wielding a sword can be as powerful as any other jutsu.”

She narrowed her eyes skeptically. “How?” she questioned, about to call bullshit.

“When combined with chakra and other techniques. For example, the samurai of the Land of Iron combine kenjutsu and chakra, and they’re truly a formidable force.”

Sakura thought for a moment. He made sense, and when she thought about it, Zabuza also had a sword. But she still wasn’t certain...

Hayate-sensei chuckled. “How about this,” he started, coughing lightly. “You come at me with all the techniques you know, full strength, and I’ll beat you with a wooden sword.”

Her hands suddenly felt clammy, and immediately she had flashbacks to the mildly traumatic bell test with Kakashi-sensei. She had already learned to never underestimate a jounin.

Nonetheless, she needed to understand her strength when compared to him, in order to know how to improve. Gulping, Sakura nodded, getting into ready position.

“Can I start?”

“Go ahead.”

Sakura began to perform a C-rank genjutsu she had learned the hand signs for, but never got to practice, as she pumped chakra into her feet, speeding behind Hayate-sensei in an attempt to conceal the jutsu’s signs. Her new mentor made no move, remaining completely unfazed as she placed the Sly Mind Affect Technique on him.

This illusion was meant to mess with the hippocampi, visual cortex, parietal lobe, thalamus and frontal lobe, confusing the target’s sense of direction, causing them to think they were moving forward, but instead they would be moving in circles.

Sakura desperately hoped it worked.

She then proceeded to try to confuse him further by making the hand signs to the Hidden Mist Jutsu, attempting to gain the advantage by ridding her opponent of his vision.

The problem was that she had also lost her own vision due to her own jutsu, and simply had to _hope_ that her target hadn’t moved as she aimed kunai at him.

(In hindsight, not the best idea.)

Hayate-sensei hadn’t moved, it seemed, as she heard the metal of her weapons meeting with wood as he probably effortlessly deflected her blades.

Sakura released the Hidden Mist Jutsu, realizing that it was only harming instead of helping her chances.

However, when she could see again, she quickly noticed that Sensei had the upper-hand and was hiding, because she couldn’t spot him anywhere. Swearing under her breath, she opened her senses and got into a ready position. She learned said position from the taijutsu scroll Tobi-sensei gave her.

The Uchiha style depended heavily on unconventional footwork: strange kicks, dirty sweeping trips and speedy runs. It was something she had studied, but had yet to apply in her training. Nonetheless, she had seen Sasuke-kun during hand-to-hand combat against Naruto and Kakashi-sensei, where he would randomly mix in the kicks with the martial arts style they learned in the Academy, so she had a great understanding of some of the motions.

But the questions was: could her body keep up with the intense movements? She would have to see, she supposed.

Suddenly, she felt a gust of wind behind her, indicating someone traveling at a breakneck speed. Her eyes widened as she turned around, only to see that there was no one there.

She kicked in front of her blindly anyways, and abruptly, something solid made impact with her foot.

_The wooden sword._

Hayate-sensei was parrying her blow with ease.

Sakura’s mentor suddenly materialized out of _thin air_ in front of her.

“Transparent Escape Technique,” he explained casually. “Allows the user to become invisible.”

Sakura’s breath hitched in her throat; that was so cool!

Then a thought hit her. She should try to escape as he’s busy thinking he won. Granted, this was a spar, but considering the huge difference in class between them, playing a little dirty should be okay… 

She sent chakra to her feet and back-tracked quickly.

“Dragon, tiger, hare,” she murmured.

Simultaneously, she made the signs to a C-rank jutsu she had been practicing for the past five days. It was still at its beginning stages of mastery, but she figured that it should be enough to gain an advantage.

“Water Release: Wild Water Wave!”

With her lips in the shape of a tight ‘O’, Sakura kneaded the little chakra she had and expelled it from her mouth. With a thin line of water, she aimed to hit her target, being careful to minimize internal damage.

Hayate-sensei smirked uncharacteristically, before he sped behind her so fast she only saw after-images. Suddenly, she was rendered helpless on the ground with the sword against her neck.

“I yield,” she gasped out.

He put the faux weapon away, before offering a hand to help her up. She took it, sitting up, winded.

He smiled warmly.

“Good job,” he told her, patting her head like Kakashi-sensei and Tobi-sensei often did. “You have a lot of potential in genjutsu, but I suppose you know that already. Your taijutsu is better than I first thought it would be, and I wasn’t expecting you to know a nature transformation.”

Sakura blushed at the compliment, teacher-pet tendencies resurfacing.

“What I’m really interested in, however, is you sending chakra to the soles of your feet.”

She tilted her head. She thought that had been the _least_ interesting aspect of her performance.

“You see, sending chakra to my feet is how I run so fast. If honed, it’s really effective when combined with a sword.”

Her eyes widened. Sakura hadn’t ever considered that she had the capability to be a high-speed runner like him, but Hayate-sensei basically confirmed that he would teach the technique to her, because she had _potential—!_

He smiled. “Not so fast,” he told her, as if reading her racing, excited thoughts. “First, you have to pick a sword, and then learn to wield it.”

Sakura glanced at the five swords Sensei had pulled out earlier, resisting the urge to groan. Nonetheless, she made her way towards the blades, before picking one randomly (because honestly, they all kind of looked the same).

“That’s the ninjatō,” Hayate-sensei supplied. “It has a straight blade, and is shorter than a katana. Meant for fast draw techniques and can be used for simultaneous attack and defense. It’s very effective for shinobi.”

Sakura nodded. It did look kind of… badass, she supposed.

“But before you touch the actual thing,” he started, grabbing the ninjatō and handing her the wooden sword, “We have to nail the basics.”

He adjusted her grip on the practice weapon.

“This is called a reverse grip…”

♟

**Konoha, May 2**

Team 7 were at Ichiraku’s.

Sasuke knew that Kakashi was purposefully ensuring that this new “squad-as-family-dinner” would become a regular occurrence on Wednesdays. Sasuke also knew that the masked jounin didn’t drag them to eat out because he particularly enjoyed their company; it was clearly a guise to keep tabs on Sakura.

Sasuke glanced at the girl in question as she finished her first bowl of ramen. She was eating while simultaneously reading scribbled words in that notebook she suddenly carried around everywhere, acting as if the rest of the world didn’t exist.

(The tension between him and Naruto was also thick since Wave. Such an atmosphere between the two boys had essentially become routine, even before Sakura took her “break” from Team 7.)

Sasuke had easily seen that his female teammate had been acting weird. Not only was she no longer asking him out on dates, or trying to get closer to him, but she was suddenly throwing herself into her missions and training.

In fact, from his apartment terrace, he would occasionally catch her on her way home from the training grounds late at night, stumbling due to the after-effects of the supposed effort she put into whatever technique she was learning.

He knew he should be glad. After all, it was him that complained that she was spending her time trying to get close to him, when really, she ought to be practicing some new jutsu.

But the issue was now that she was too “busy” for Team 7, there was no one to sit between him and Naruto when the tension was suffocatingly high.

She was messing up the squad dynamics because _she_ was changing. It annoyed him.

“Teuchi-san,” Sakura suddenly called. “Can I order another bowl of ramen, please?”

“Another one?” the owner’s daughter _—_ Ayame was her name, Sasuke recalled _—_ questioned, and Sakura turned slightly red with embarrassment. “Naruto ordering more than one bowl, I understand, but you? I mean _..._ you’re so skinny!”

“Exactly, I’m underweight,” she explained sheepishly. “So to gain muscle, I need to put on more weight, so I need to eat more.” She smiled.

Sasuke’s eye twitched slightly in annoyance.

Only two months ago, Sakura would have rather died than put on weight. That was his point; she was changing.

(Part of him understood her. After all, he himself became a completely different person after his clan was killed by _that man_.

But unlike him, Sakura was also secretive; she was hiding something, and he was going to find out what was truly messing up the dynamics of the squad _—_ the squad that Kakashi insinuated would show him that teamwork could be better than the vengeance he craved against _that man_.)

♟

**Konoha, May 4**

Hayate and Sakura had set up a harsh training regime, a request his new student had made specifically.

For the past week, they met up everyday, and he supervised her as she tirelessly practiced Iaidō, the technique of pulling out the sword from her scabbard, striking, wiping the blade, and then placing it back in the scabbard.

She wasn’t the fastest learner he taught (although the little time it was taking her to grasp the basics was nothing to scoff at). But, she was an unstoppable force, persisting and never giving up, despite the boring, repetitive movements she was doing. He could only imagine how much her arm ached in that moment.

However, he was worried that she was overworking herself.

Abruptly, he stopped her movements, grabbing the wooden sword from her grip.

“That’s enough for the day,” he told her, smiling. “You did very well _—_ ”

“But I’m not ready to finish!” she yelled suddenly, reaching for the practice weapon. “I can still do more,” she growled, grabbing for the confiscated sword, eyes holding a restless glint.

“That’s enough,” he asserted, voice tougher, and she froze.

Pause.

His voice softened. “Trust me,” Hayate told her. “I train ANBU often, so I know that overworking your body will just cause you to crash and burn. I’ve seen it countless times. It’s better for you to go home, rest for two days with no training whatsoever, and then come back refreshed.”

She nodded, but she was clearly very, very unhappy.

He patted her head gently, “Get a good night of sleep.”

♟

Afterwards, Sakura marched home from her training session with Hayate-sensei unhappily.

She was _just_ starting to get the hang of the ninjatō, and he decided to stop her so suddenly. For _two freaking days_! What was she supposed to do for _two days_?!

As she neared her home, however, her thoughts shifted as Sakura saw her mother leaving the house with a traveling pack on her back.

“...Mama…?”

“Ah _—_ Sakura-chan!” her mother exclaimed, waving her over. “I left a note, but I’m going to the Land of Earth for work right now.”

Sakura furrowed her eyebrows. “Why do you have to go so far away now?” she questioned, annoyed. “I mean, Papa’s insurance _—_ ”

“ _—_ only covered the debt,” Mama finished, sighing guiltily. “I still have to pay the bills, you know…”

Pause.

Sakura frowned.

“I understand,” she nodded, hugging the older woman. “Be safe, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Mama echoed, kissing her forehead. “I packed a bento for lunch. Also, don’t be afraid to ask Kuroyagi-san for help for anything. See you really, really soon, sweetheart.”

And then Mama was gone, and Sakura was alone in the house (and in the back of her mind, it finally dawned on her that although Mama would come back, Papa wouldn’t).

She sat at the dining table, eating her bento, feeling alone and restless. Tomorrow was Team 7’s day off, and she didn’t know who she supposed to train with now that Hayate-sensei cancelled on her _—_

All of a sudden, Tobi-sensei teleported to the seat in front of her.

“Hello, Sakura-chan!” he exclaimed.

She grinned stupidly, unfazed by his abrupt entrance.

_Perfect timing!_

“Sensei!” she exclaimed, standing up. “Are you here to train me?” she asked eagerly, bouncing up and down.

The man tapped his orange mask playfully, as if in deep thought. “Depends,” he started, “on if you feed me! I am your house guest until your mother returns, after all!”

Pause.

A vein popped in Sakura’s forehead.

“Huh?! Who decided _that_?!”

(Sakura was anything _but_ stupid.

She knew that, realistically, the man in front of her was dangerous, and the comical appearance he donned was just a mask. So, she began to play his game, donning her own mask.

Why was Sakura playing along, one may ask?

Because Tobi-sensei had power.

He was another resource, like Kakashi-sensei and Hayate-sensei; someone she could use to make her body a stronger tool, so she could get powerful enough to make sure no one around her could be used as a tool.

Perhaps she was a walking contradiction _—_

Perhaps she didn’t care, too lost in her pursuit for power to see much of anything else _—_

That, and she was growing slightly attached to the man in the mask, who had a knack for showing up at the right time.)

♟

**Konoha, May 7**

Sakura was discovering that, unlike Tobi-sensei, her other two mentors were soft.

She figured that in the case of Hayate-sensei, gentleness was an integral part of his personality, so she wasn’t too concerned about his teaching methods; he was a good mentor, either way.

However, as she sat on the floor, meditating and watching the boys spar after Team 7’s recent mission, it suddenly hit her: why hadn’t Kakashi-sensei ever asked her to spar with the boys?

How else did he expect her to learn, now that she didn’t have a training partner?

(She used to have Ino. But she hadn’t seen Ino in over two weeks. She figured their newly re-discovered friendship was over before if could even begin, considering how absolutely rude Sakura had been to her after her father passed.)

Sakura sighed, continuing to meditate, resolving that soon, she would prove to Kakashi-sensei that she could match the boys.

After Team 7 seperated, Sakura rushed home, ignoring the whispers of neighbors around her, and ducking into her house, where Tobi-sensei was waiting.

“Sakura-chan!” he exclaimed, coming out of the kitchen room. “How was training with that Bakakashi?”

Sakura burst out laughing, delinquent side arising.

 _‘Bakakashi…! That’s hilarious!’_ Inner wheezed.

Once she collected herself from her cackling fit, she responded to the previous question with a simple, “Training was boring.”

She pouted.

“Ne, Sensei, can we spar, please—?”

Right then and there, the man in the orange mask attacked her with a harsh kick, one she wouldn’t have been able to dodge only a week ago. She heard him giggle, and soon enough, he transported them into the Other Dimension for their upcoming hand-to-hand spar.

She smirked as she got into ready position.

(Unlike Kakashi-sensei, Tobi-sensei was merciless. Without hesitation, she knew he would attack her everywhere, including her face, never pulling his punches.

It was painful, yes, but it was a tough type of love; unlike “Bakakashi”, as he began to refer to her squad leader, Tobi-sensei told her he cared enough to hurt her so she could defend herself against others.

So she could learn.)

Once their spar was done, he let her use him as a practice dummy of sorts, allowing her to put him under all the genjutsu she learned from the Nidaime Mizukage’s secret scrolls.

She was finally beginning to reach mastery over the D-ranks.

As he casually dispelled the illusions, he told her something that stuck with her:

“Sakura-chan,” Tobi-sensei said, voice deep. “You know that most men are naturally physically stronger and usually have a predisposition for possessing more chakra than women, right?”

Sakura nodded, frowning.

“Don’t let that fact discourage you, however,” he added quickly. “Women, unlike men, are typically more flexible and have better chakra control. Use that biological aspect to your advantage.”

There was a silence, as the man in the orange mask casually dispelled yet another illusion she cast.

“Anyhow, if you work hard, and find solutions, you can beat most men in chakra reserves and physical strength! I’m certain of it!”

Tobi-sensei ruffled her hair, and she smiled, happy someone believed in her.

♟

**Konoha, May 14**

Kakashi observed his students as the trio waited at their designated meeting spot, sitting with meters of distance between them. He frowned. Their teamwork was suffering tremendously; more than he thought possible, and unlike before, Sakura wasn’t actively putting herself between the boys to lessen the tension.

“Where the heck is that stupid old pervert!” Naruto yelled suddenly, nostrils flaring.

“Shut up, loser,” Sasuke snapped calmly, staring at Sakura analytically.

His eyes narrowed when the kunoichi didn’t reprimand Naruto alongside him, as she was evidently too immersed in her own meditation to give a damn.

The atmosphere thickened instantaneously.

At that point, Kakashi decided to jump in.

“Morning,” he greeted from the rails of the bridge, not giving the blond one time to respond to his tardiness. “Meet me at the training grounds.”

And then he shunshin-ed away.

When his team eventually reached the training grounds, side-by-side, he smiled. “Alright,” he started. “We’re resuming our regular training sessions today.”

During the days Sakura hadn’t shown up to missions, he had continued to train the boys. In that time, Naruto had made significant progress in terms of strategy. Sasuke, combining his training with the time-slot Sakura usually had, began to learn casting genjutsu with his Sharingan.

He glanced at the pink-haired student. It hurt, because she was opening up scars of his own childhood, a fact he wouldn't admit. “We’ll start up with Sakura’s training first _—_ ”

“I want you to train us together today,” Sasuke suddenly cut in, voice monotone.

“Hm,” Kakashi murmured, tilting his head slightly, watching Sakura’s eyes widen and Naruto’s narrow. “Any reason for this, Sasuke?”

“She’s learning genjutsu release, right?” he questioned.

Kakashi nodded.

“It would be beneficial for both of us if I cast genjutsu on her with my Sharingan, and she can try to break out of them. She’s the most analytical, and the best at understanding the art of breaking illusions in our squad, after all.”

And then he _winked_ at her, no longer resembling his older brother, instead looking like a mix of Obito and Kakashi himself _—_

Kakashi donned a momentarily puzzled expression. Why did he just think _that_?

Naruto positively lost his mind, growling: “Sasuke you bastard! Stop flirting with Sakura-chan!”

The Uchiha’s lips formed into an unimpressed line, but the tips of his ears became a bit red. Sakura’s cheeks were even redder.

Kakashi ignored his genin for a moment, contemplating Sasuke’s motives silently. He knew the boy had a compulsive desire to test the extent of his abilities against others (a trait Itachi also apparently possessed, since he massacred his clan for that same reason) _—_

But Sasuke never thought that highly about the girl’s non-specialized abilities, therefore, Kakashi decided that he was trying to apologize for the way he treated Sakura before her extended break, without actually saying sorry.

He cut into Naruto’s complaining.

“Okay _—_ we’ll test out how training you two together goes,” he affirmed, eyes crinkling.

Just like the bell test, Sasuke displayed that he could be good at teamwork when he wanted to be. It gave Kakashi hope for their team’s future.

(He had been too hopeful, he would soon discover.)

♟

Obito, on the other hand, saw through Sasuke’s motivations.

As he observed Sakura from the shadow of trees, he knew instantly that everything was but a facade, because Sasuke’s true intentions were to investigate why Sakura changed.

He certainly couldn’t have _that_ being revealed, because then he risked revealing his connection with her.

♟

Sakura was standing across from her black-haired teammate, staring directly into his dreamy eyes, face feeling hotter than the flames from the times Tobi-sensei moderately burned her with a fire jutsu during training.

She couldn’t help her reaction, despite that idiot, Naruto, glaring at them vigorously from the sidelines. This was _Sasuke-kun_ ; the coolest boy in the Academy; the boy she had a crush on since she was so young; the boy whose abilities she had respected so much since she could remember.

...And Sasuke-kun clearly respected her abilities enough to request to train with her!

His Sharingan activated, eyes gleaming a deep, blood red with two tomoe in each. Sakura made the tiger hand sign, promising to use this opportunity to her advantage and get stronger.

“Start easy, Sasuke,” Kakashi-sensei cautioned.

He nodded, before waiting for her indication to commence.

“I’m ready, Sasuke-kun!”

She suddenly felt her surroundings begin to shift, and she broke out of the illusion immediately, grinning proudly.

Sasuke-kun smirked. 

The first five jutsus were fairly standard, and Sakura broke out of them with easy.

However, soon, they began to get progressively harder to dispel. Sweat began to form on her forehead, and around the fifteenth illusion, Sakura’s body was burning in the genjutsu, and she _couldn’t_ _get out_.

She screamed as the flames spread _everywhere_ , and it felt so _fucking_ real _—_

She vaguely felt Kakashi-sensei’s palm on her back in the real world, forcefully pumping chakra into her body.

Once she was released, she found herself still staring into Sasuke-kun’s now-brown eyes. Sakura stumbled, only to be caught by Naruto, and she registered that the blond was yelling loudly next to her.

“Sasuke, you went too far!” he shouted.

Sakura began to shake slightly, but it wasn’t out of fear; it was out of fury, because she realized how unfair it was that, despite her being trained in genjutsu by Kakashi-sensei _and_ Tobi-sensei, _Sasuke-kun_ was immediately better at it because he possessed good genetics.

He wasn’t even the genjutsu type. He didn’t even have to train in using hand seals, nor did he have to study _—_ he simply had to make eye-contact and think-up a scenario, and _bam_.

As per always, she took her frustrations out on her blond teammate.

“Shut up, Naruto,” Sakura suddenly snapped, voice lower and crueler than her usual reprimands. “ _You_ don’t get to decide what’s too far for _me_ ; I’m a kunoichi, not some damn damsel in distress here to exist in your _‘I’m the hero who saved the princess’_ wet-dreams.”

Immediately, she clasped her mouth with her hand, knowing she had acted too harshly, guilt pooling in her heart when she saw Naruto’s face twitch with hurt. He didn’t deserve it, and yet she had been cruel to him because she couldn’t handle the fact that genetics ensured she would be the weakest in the squad.

She closed her eyes. “Sorry…” she whispered, before turning around.

Silence.

“I’m going home now. I’ve been feeling sick all day,” she lied.

No one objected.

On her way out of the training grounds, she cursed herself. She was so selfish, so compulsive _—_

Tobi-sensei popped out of the trees.

“I see we need to work on breaking Sharingan-based genjutsu,” he teased.

Sakura’s lips quivered, and she looked down in shame.

“I’m sorry, Sensei...”

He offered her his hand without an explanation, and she took it, preparing to move to the Other Dimension.

She proceeded to dispel general Sharingan images for three hours, until she shook of chakra-exhaustion, as well as the memories of the illusions, constantly recalling the sensations of bones cracking, swords impaling and lightning shooting through her.

She felt so out of touch from the physical world, she couldn’t tell if her surroundings were real or fake anymore.

(Sakura never once questioned why the man in the orange mask was spying on her team earlier.)

♟

That night, when Naruto was alone in his apartment, he felt tears begin to form in his eyes.

Annoyed with himself, he created shadow clones, and unlike usual, where he beat his doppelgangers up, he instructed them to beat him up, trying to compensate for how he certainly lost his relationship with Sakura-chan, one of the few people he had.

One of the few people who looked him in the eye and didn’t see a monster.

The coping-mechanism didn’t work, he realized, as he laid on the floor, bloodied and feeling alone, letting the demon within heal his trivial bruises. 

♟

**Konoha, May 24**

It was Obito’s last night as Sakura’s “house guest”, because the next day, her mother would be returning from the Land of Earth.

It was an interesting experience, spending so much time with someone that wasn't a Zetsu. Sakura had kindly offered him a room, but he told her he wouldn’t be here in the nights, so it was irrelevant.

For dinner, his student’s land-lady dropped by dango, and they ate it together. Sakura would try to get a peek of under his mask, but she would always conveniently miss it when he quickly devoured the food that one moment she looked away.

That was the only useful trick Bakakashi had ever taught him, anyways.

Sakura was evidently getting frustrated, and then her eyes widened, as if she had the best idea in the world.

“Hey, Sensei…” she started cautiously. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“Why do you wear a mask?”

Ah. So they were playing the game of metaphors.

He stroked where his chin would be with fake contemplation.

“Well,” he began. “To hide what’s underneath.”

She paused, before opening her mouth again. “And what’s underneath…?” she posed.

He tilted his head to the side. “No one. It’s empty,” Obito said nonchalantly. “And if someone did live there _—_ well _,_ they’re dead.”

♟

_No one._

...

_It’s empty._

...

_And if someone did live there _—_ well, they’re dead._

…

The words kept repeating in Sakura’s mind as she stared at her hands.

That’s why she couldn’t recognize herself _—_

The Sakura she thought she was hadn’t ever existed _—_

The Sakura Ino had built was a mask that had been fragmented in Wave, and her father’s death had obliterated the mask completely _—_

She was but a shell of who she used to be, and she hated it, so her resolve grew; she would become strong enough to make sure no one else felt what she felt; that no one else would be used like her, as if she was an object.

Meanwhile, Tobi-sensei began to monologue, voice deep:

“Listen, everywhere in this world, wherever light strikes, there are always shadows. So long as the concept of victors exists, the losers will also exist. The selfish intent of wanting to preserve peace initiates wars and hatred in born in order to protect love. These are all nexuses...”

Sakura merely pretended she was listening, but she had long since learned to tune out his pessimistic speeches. Instead, she kept repeating her nindō in her head:

_Become strong enough. Protect everyone from being used._

♟

**Konoha, May 25**

The following morning, before Tobi-sensei left from her house, he gave her some reading material. She took the texts happily, having finished reading the other ones he gave her, which she had concealed in a sealing scroll, hidden under a loose floorboard in her rom.

"Keep improving your skills, and I'll see you on the first day of June. We're going on a trip."

Sakura nodded mutely, smiling. 

"By the way," he added casually. "Do not let your black-haired teammate get too close to you. He doesn't really care about you. He's playing you. He just wants to know why you've changed, that's all."

Sakura's heart felt like it was breaking in her chest as she blindly believed the man in the orange mask. So Sasuke-kun never respected her abilities. He was just using her, to get what he wanted, hiding behind a mask of pure intentions. 

"Do not succumb to his game, and do not let him discover _anything_." 

Then he was gone, and five minutes later, Sakura's mother walked through the door. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ✿ Will Sasuke discover "the secret"? If so, how? What will happen next? Leave your predictions in the comments! ;)  
> ✿ Next up: Team Gai (especially Tenten, Lee and NEJI); tension with Team Kurenai; tension within Team 7; actual Hayate-Sakura bonding, since this chapter mainly focused on skill.  
> ✿ The question of genetics vs hard work will also be addressed. As well as free will vs Nature & Nurture. Prepare for lots of philosophy to be addressed XD  
> ✿ Thank you for reading!!!


End file.
